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If you don't know where that is, just go to the second floor and go all as far as you can

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until you get to the playground.

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And then you know you've gone too far.

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You turn around and come back and it's the first room right beside the playground, okay?

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Well, a couple of weeks ago I was ill on Thanksgiving weekend.

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And so what I've done is to take that text and repackage it for today.

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It sort of works like this.

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How many of you husbands have ever bought a Christmas present, for example, for your wife,

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and you had it wrapped nicely and then you put it away somewhere?

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And when Christmas came you couldn't find it.

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And so middle of January, sure enough, here it shows up.

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You discover it.

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And so what do you do?

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Well, you perhaps unwrap it and you put Valentine paper around it.

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And you give it to her for Valentine's Day, right?

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So what I've done is to take this text and I've taken off the Thanksgiving wrapping

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and I've put Christmas wrapping on it and presented it to you this morning

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so that we have covered all of that that I wanted to cover in this series on the last days.

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Advent is one of my favorite seasons of the year and I love the music of Christmas.

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I know that some of you men are already thinking about what you're going to buy your wives

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and probably most of you already shopped and done all of it, right?

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So if you haven't done that yet, I have some hints for you men who are shopping for your wives.

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Just some things to keep in mind as you go out.

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Number one, never give your wife any kind of household appliance or something that's going

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to make household work easier for her, such as one of those brooms that you see on television

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or one of the mops that you see or those dust claws.

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Avoid anything that you see in an infomercial.

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That's hint number one.

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Hint number two, don't give her any bulk cleaning supplies.

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Okay? Now, Costco has some great deals.

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I understand that.

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But don't present a big box of Tide to her and say, here, honey, I know you always wanted this.

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Number three, avoid giving her any sharp objects made by Ronco with slice and dice.

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And none of the Jinsu knives.

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Stay away from those.

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Number four, do not buy gifts for yourself and then pretend that they're for her.

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Okay? Don't say, here, honey, here's that drill I know you've always wanted.

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Finally, let me say that if you're going to buy her lingerie, do not buy flannel,

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especially the kind with feet in them.

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Okay? So just some hints for your Christmas shopping this year.

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Some of you guys sort of need it, right?

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Well, Advent season reminds us of the greatest gift ever given,

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and that is God's gift of His Son.

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It's the most remarkable period in human history, at least to date.

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It is when God Himself became man and He lived among us for a little while.

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That was the fulfillment of God's promise made hundreds and hundreds of years before,

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stated many times and in many different ways.

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And that was the promise to provide a final deliverer.

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That is someone who could deal with humanity's greatest problem,

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and that is our slavery to selfishness and sinfulness.

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And God promised that this deliverer would be a descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob,

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and then one who would bless all of the nations.

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I remind you of this verse, and by the way, I think it's in your notes.

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If not, it'll be on the screen, but I encourage you to pull out your notes.

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We'll be looking at a number of texts this morning.

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In Genesis chapter 12 and verse 3, God said this, among other things, to Abraham,

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all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

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Now, the apostle Paul takes that phrase, and he brings it into his writing

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of the book of Galatians chapter 3 and verse 8.

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And I want you to take a look at what he does with that verse from Genesis.

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And the scriptures, for seeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith,

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preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying,

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all the nations shall be blessed in you.

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Isn't that interesting?

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And then in Galatians, in the fourth chapter, the apostle said,

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and when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth what?

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His son made of a woman.

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There's the first advent, the Christmas story.

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God sent forth his son being birthed by a woman.

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You see, advent is about God coming down here to the earth.

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But advent also reminds us of a larger story, that although God was here on the earth

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and the person of Jesus 2,000 years ago, that was only the first phase of his plan

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to redeem the lost race of Adam.

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Eventually, God's plan is to bring about a totally new creation.

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He's already started that really in us because the Bible says that anyone be in Christ,

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that is a follower of Christ by faith, he is a what?

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A new creation, a new creature.

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So God has already begun that work, but someday it's going to involve a whole new universe.

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God will send his son the second time to accomplish that.

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And that's what we've been talking about in this series on the last days.

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God is going to send his son and fully effect the salvation

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that he secured the first time that he came.

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Hebrews 9.28 says, Christ was once offered to take away the sins of many people.

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And he will appear a second time, not to bear sin,

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but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.

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That's the outcome of the last days.

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Now we've studied this theme for several weeks,

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so we have seen that the last days is a very broad biblical theme,

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predicting a period of time that will bring about horror and suffering

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and the pouring out of God's wrath in the world.

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And all of that will precede the culmination of it,

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which is blessing and salvation through Christ's return to the earth.

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Now if I'm correct, the last days, which is a period of time biblically speaking

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from the first coming until the second coming, at least 2,000 years long now,

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the last days have toward the end of them another period that we might call also

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the last days, the last days of the last days.

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And that's when this time yet to be fulfilled is going to happen on the earth.

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And having learned a little bit more about that last week in particular,

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you may say to yourself, how am I going to make it through?

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What am I going to hang on to if we are in fact entering into this period of time called

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the last days of the last days?

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What I want to say to you this morning from the book of Hebrews, the first chapter is this,

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that you can face whatever lies ahead with joy and confidence

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if you lay hold of your last day spiritual benefits.

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You see, people in previous generations envy you.

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Because of the benefits that come to you, because of the period of time in which you live.

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That's explained to us here in the first three verses of the book of Hebrews.

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In the past, that is before this age, God spoke to our forefathers through the prophets

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at many times and in various ways.

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But in these last days, he has spoken to us by his son, whom he appointed heir of all things

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and through whom he made the universe.

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The son is the radiance of God's glory and the exact representation of his being.

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Sustaining all things by his powerful word.

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After he had provided purification for sins, he sat down at the right hand of the majesty in heaven.

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Friends, in those three verses, God lays out for us some benefits that we have in these last days

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so that we can make some bold statements that will see us through the years to come.

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Bold statements that will see us through the last days.

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We can enter into this period of time with joy and confidence because number one,

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we can boldly say, I know God's final word.

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We can say this.

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People before this age could not say it.

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But we know God's final word. It says here, God has spoken to us by his son.

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People in previous generations heard God's voice.

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God spoke to them through the prophets many times, various ways, in bits and pieces.

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Just bits and pieces.

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That's how they saw things.

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Something like a puzzle.

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They had the pieces to the puzzle, but they didn't know what they were doing.

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They had the puzzle, but they didn't have the frame for the puzzle.

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And so they didn't know how all of these things fit together.

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So they had God's truth in bits and pieces, but they didn't understand how they fit.

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But in these last days, God has spoken to us by his son.

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And in doing that, God has given us the framework for the puzzle.

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God has spoken fully, definitively, conclusively in Christ.

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We should expect that there will be no prophet superior to Christ who will come after him.

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There is no place in God's plan for another prophet by the name of Muhammad.

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He is a false prophet.

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There is no room for a prophet by the name of Joseph Smith.

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He is a false prophet.

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Or any other person who claims to speak with some later revelation.

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For Jesus Christ is God's final word.

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And you all remember the old E.F. Hutton commercial, right?

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When they speak, what?

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That's right.

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And I want to tell you something.

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When God speaks, there's nothing more to be said.

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When God speaks, that's it.

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It's full.

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It's complete.

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And he has spoken in his son.

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You say, well, there are lots of voices in our world today.

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And some of them disagree with God.

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When I lived in Kentucky 10 years, there was a phrase that I learned.

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I've never heard it spoken outside of Kentucky, probably with good reason.

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But it kind of gets to the point of this.

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It says, it don't make no never mind.

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It don't make no never mind.

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In other words, it doesn't make any difference if you hear other voices.

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Because God has spoken.

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That's it.

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That's it.

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What God will do in the last days is to exalt his son through whom he's spoken.

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You see, the last days are really all about Jesus.

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The last days are about God vindicating Jesus, acclaiming Jesus, revealing Jesus,

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who he is to everyone so that someday every knee will bow and every tongue will

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confess that he is Lord.

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Eventually, everything will come under his absolute and direct rule.

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That's what the last days are all about.

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God's son and what he has said through him.

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Some of you enjoy reading the book of the Revelation.

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And a few of you are right now reading through the book.

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I commend you for that.

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You may not understand everything that you read, to say the least.

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But it is the only book in the Bible that promises a special blessing to anyone who reads it.

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So read it.

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The book is introduced by these words.

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The revelation of things that are going to come about in the future.

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Is that what it says?

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No.

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The revelation of who?

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The revelation of the future.

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The revelation of who?

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Jesus Christ.

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The book of Revelation does deal with some future things, but that's not its purpose.

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Its purpose is to show us the glory that is uniquely Jesus Christ's.

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It is the book of Revelation about him.

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You see, this word that God has spoken through Jesus is the key that unites all of history.

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All of it comes together under the Lordship of Jesus Christ, eventually.

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Therefore, I can say this.

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I don't have to worry.

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I don't have to worry about the future because Jesus ties it all together.

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I don't have to be alarmed and frustrated about what's going to happen tomorrow or

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what's going to happen next on God's calendar.

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I think I know.

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But I don't have to worry about those things because Jesus Christ holds it all together,

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and I am Jesus Christ.

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Therefore, I am free from worry.

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I don't have to try to figure it out.

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All I have to do is keep my eyes on him.

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So how will you make it through the last days?

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You will make it through because you keep your eyes on Jesus, because he is God's final word.

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That's all you need.

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That's all you need.

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There's a second benefit that we see here, and that is I can boldly say,

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because I live in the last days, I understand history's big picture.

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You and I know all that is necessary for us to know.

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If you have a story before you and you know the beginning of the story,

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and you know the ending of the story, and you know the events in the middle and how they all

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fall out, why read the book, right?

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Why go to the movie?

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Because you already know it all.

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Jesus Christ is the beginning and the end.

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He's the Alpha, and he's the what?

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The Omega.

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You and I know the beginning, we know the ending, and we have everything in between in him.

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And that's essentially what the writer says here.

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Notice what he says.

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Through the Son, God made the universe.

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That's the beginning.

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That's the start of it all.

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He says, God appointed the Son heir of all things.

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That's the future.

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Everything eventually belongs to him and is under his rule.

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The beginning and the ending.

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And then he says, the Son sustains all things by his powerful word.

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That's everything in between.

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The beginning, the ending, everything in between is all about Jesus Christ.

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Now the universe is not eternal.

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Scientists are discovering this now after having followed a stray idea brought about,

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frankly, through evolution.

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That the universe must surely be eternal.

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All that has ever been, all that will ever be is the cosmos, says Carl Sagan.

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He knows better now.

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The universe has a beginning, and scientists understand that through the Big Bang Theory.

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Now they may not know all about it, but they know that it had a beginning.

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And they've also discovered that the universe is going to one day come to an end.

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That the universe is going to one day contract.

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Again, they don't have the details of Revelation from God's word on it.

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But they know from their theories of science that the universe eventually is going to contract and be no more.

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They know now that it has an ending.

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And we know that as it's laid out right now, the whole cosmos is like a poem that God has written.

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And Jesus is the origin, Jesus is the heir of it all in the end, and all of history and all of its eras in between are planned out.

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And all of those successive periods of time, however many there be, were all planned out through Jesus Christ.

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As it says in Hebrews 11.3, by faith we understand that the world, the word there literally is the ages,

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the eons of time, the successive periods of time, were prepared by the word of God.

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Who is the word of God? Jesus Christ, the Son.

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So that what is seen was made out of things which are, what is seen was not made rather out of things which are visible.

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So my friends, you and I understand history's big picture.

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We understand that now. People in the past did not grasp this.

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But in these last days we know this to be true. God tells us the beginning, the end, it all is about Jesus.

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God has the big picture all planned out.

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And if God has the big picture planned out, let me assure you, He has your life, your piece of that, planned out too.

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The words of David in Psalm 139,

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For you created my inmost being, you Lord knit me together in my mother's womb.

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And then down in verse 16 it says, all the days ordained for me were written in your book before one of them came to be.

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What is David saying here? He's saying, Lord, before I was even conceived you had all of my days planned out.

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How are you going to make it through the last days?

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Well, I want to tell you how you're going to do that.

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By understanding that you don't have to question your life's purpose.

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Because God has a plan for you.

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God does.

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Now you may not understand this plan. In fact, you can only see it a day, even a moment at a time.

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Whatever lies ahead, whatever events there be, however long we're going to be here on the earth,

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all of those things are planned out by God and you and I don't have to question what God is doing.

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The universe did not originate with an unplanned big bang and you did not originate with an unplanned accident.

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God has planned for you to be alive right now in this period of time, in this generation,

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and He has a purpose for your life.

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And one of the greatest discoveries you can make is God's plan for you to be alive.

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One of the greatest discoveries you can make is God's purpose for you and to live that out.

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What a benefit you've got.

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People in past ages are jealous of what you've got that they didn't have the privilege of possessing.

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Third, my last day benefits include these.

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This, I have confidence in God's nature.

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I have confidence in God's nature.

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The text says the sun is the radiance of God's glory and the what?

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The exact representation of His being.

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Now, people have lots of ideas about God and most of them are pretty screwy.

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As you read in our world today and even some of the most popular books that are being sold in the

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bookstores, reminds you of the old proverb of the blind man feeling an elephant trying to figure out

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what it is.

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They're so lost, so groping in their spiritual darkness that they cannot understand God, although

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God has revealed Himself.

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But they're trying to figure God out and what inevitably happens is that they make God in their

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own image.

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Is God a good God or is He bad?

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Is God angry?

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Does God care about us personally?

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Is God evolving and changing with time?

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That's one of the latest theories of liberal theologians.

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Obviously, you see where they get it from, evolution, the whole philosophy of evolution,

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evolution, the whole philosophy of it, they apply to theology and God's changing too over time.

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Or is God the same yesterday, today, and forever?

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Is God personal or is He the force who's with you?

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Is God real or is God imaginary?

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Is God kind and loving?

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Or is God capricious and potentially mean as the Muslims fear that He is?

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These things matter.

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How can I make it through the last days if I don't know what God is really like?

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You see, I have confidence in God's nature and that's because of the sun.

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Notice the two phrases used to describe the sun.

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First one is he is the radiance of God's glorious being.

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He is the shining out of who God really is.

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In the Old Testament, there was this appearance of God's glory that was called, does anybody know?

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Shka'ina is the Hebrew word, the glorious appearance of God.

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The glorious appearance of God. The glorious appearance of God was incarnated in the person

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of Christ so that we can actually look at that glory and see exactly what it's like.

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He goes on to say it's the exact representation of God's very nature.

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The word there is where we get our English word character.

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Do any of you remember the name Underwood?

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Well, let me ask it this way.

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Do any of you remember a mechanical machine called a typewriter?

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Underwood was a type of typewriter.

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And what happened with those, and I know for some of you this is like going into a museum,

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but there were keys on the keyboard and you would push the key and it actually went down.

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And that caused a reaction, a mechanical reaction, and there was a lever inside that went up.

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And on the end of that was a little character.

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And it would hit an actual ribbon of ink.

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Can you believe that?

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And it would impress the character on the paper leaving a mark there.

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That's exactly what this word there is.

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That's exactly what this word means, the exact representation.

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Jesus Christ is the impression of deity on human flesh, human nature.

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So that when we look at Jesus, we are seeing exactly what God is like.

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Therefore, I know God is loving and caring.

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I know that God is merciful and gracious because that's what Jesus is like.

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You see, I don't have to question God's care because Jesus shows it to me.

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I don't have to worry about whether God's going to take care of me in the last days

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or whatever tough thing I'm passing through because Jesus shows me how much God cares

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about me, about you.

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The whole phrase here indicates that the Son is distinct from and yet equal to

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the one whose essence is imprinted upon Him.

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You and I have the wonderful benefit, the confidence of who God is by His nature

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because we live in the last days.

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Jesus has come and showed us God.

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There's a fourth benefit that I want to talk about briefly and that is,

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my last day benefits include I enjoy amnesty from God's wrath.

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You believe in amnesty?

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Well, we ought to believe in this guy.

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Amnesty means release.

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He provided purification for sins.

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The big problem, the big problem, my sins.

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My sins separate me from God.

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My sins keep me out of God's holy presence.

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My selfishness, my self-centeredness separate me from God.

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But Jesus has provided purification for sins.

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The word purification here is catharsis.

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Catharsis, now we use that word in our English language in drama, medicine,

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in psychotherapy.

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It's also used in religious expressions like here.

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What it means is to release from one condition or one experience

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and to be restored to another.

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So people can go through a psychological catharsis by some experience they have

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and they're changed by it.

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They're released from what they were before, they become something else.

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What it's saying here is that we are released, we are changed,

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we are restored to something we were not before by Jesus purification of our sins.

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The writer talks about this more in chapter 10 when he says,

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we have confidence to enter the most holy place.

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Question.

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What was it that kept people out of the most holy place in the Old Testament?

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Sins.

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Sins.

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Even the high priest could not go behind the veil into the most holy presence of God without blood

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that had to be sprinkled for his sins and the sins of the people.

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The writer says here, we have confidence to enter the most holy place by the blood of Jesus,

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by a new and living way opened for us through the curtain that is his body.

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So what was it that physically separated the most holy place from the rest of the temple?

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It was a curtain, right?

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What happened to that place?

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It was a curtain, right? What happened to that curtain at the very moment that Jesus said,

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it is finished, it was torn in two from the top to the bottom?

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That curtain was a symbol of his body in which he suffered and died.

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And as he died, that curtain was torn in two and the way into God's holy presence was

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now opened, it says, because Jesus has provided the cleansing for our sins.

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In the Old Testament, this was illustrated in the Day of Atonement by the scapegoats.

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You familiar with that concept? Two goats were brought to the high priest.

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One of them, the high priest would place his hands on the heads of the goats and confess the sins of

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Israel. One of the goats was then taken and sacrificed and the blood was sprinkled in a

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certain way in the tabernacle of the temple. The other goat was then led out into the wilderness

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and released. Symbolically, that goat was carrying away the sins of the people.

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What this idea of catharsis is to embrace both of these, Jesus died to pay the penalty

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and he carried away our sins. In the Old Testament, it was all by atonement, which means a what?

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A covering over. God just covered over the sins, but they were not carried away, taken away.

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But when Jesus died, all of those sins and all of our sins were carried away. The record was cleansed

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because of the worth of his sacrifice blood for us. I enjoy amnesty from God's wrath.

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You say, what's that got to do with the last days? Well, remember last week,

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I told you that there's coming on the earth this time called the tribulation.

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It is a time when God's wrath is going to be poured out upon the earth because of its rejection

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of his Son. It will be a horrible time of suffering. The encouragement that I have from this

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is that because you and I have amnesty from God's wrath, we're not going to be there for that.

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And not everybody agrees with me on this, but I believe that because we have already received

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amnesty and cleansing from sin and therefore amnesty from God's wrath, that it would be

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entirely inappropriate for us to be in the world when God's wrath is poured out. We have not been

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appointed to wrath, but to what? Salvation. Paul writes to the Thessalonians.

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I don't have to fear God's judgment because Jesus cleanses me. Jesus cleanses me.

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Finally, I want to say my last day benefit that I can enjoy is that I have a high priest who

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intercedes. A high priest who intercedes. He sat down at the right hand of the majesty on high.

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breastplate. This was a piece of silver. He would have a breastplate on his chest.

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Now this relates to the high priest of the Old Testament who represented Israel before God.

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And on that day of atonement, for example, he would enter into the holiest place in the temple

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and as he did, he would have on his chest a breastplate. This was a piece of silver.

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And on that day of atonement, for example, he would enter into the holiest place in the temple

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And on that day of atonement, for example, he would enter into the holiest place in the temple

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and as he did, he would have on his chest a breastplate. This was a piece of solid gold about that large

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and embedded in it were 12 precious stones. And on each one of those stones engraved the name

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of one of the 12 tribes of Israel. So that when he went into the presence of God,

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he represented the whole nation. You and I have a high priest.

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As the writer of Hebrews says, who has passed through the heavens. Who is it? Jesus, the Son of God.

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You and I have a high priest who enters into the very holy place and he remains there

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in the presence of God, among other things, praying for us as a group and for us individually.

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And so we are invited, it says in verse 16 of chapter 4, to approach the throne of grace,

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the mercy seat, with confidence that we may receive mercy and grace to help us in our time of need.

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Are you in a time of need today? You have one who prays for you at the throne of grace.

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Simply approach the throne of grace and you have the mercy, the grace that you need today.

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Will you need it tomorrow? Will you need it in the last days and those events coming on the earth?

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The high priest is there my friend and your name is engraved upon his breastplate,

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even upon his hands by the nails of the cross. He represents you before God.

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He represents you before God. There's a great old hymn that left the hymnals years ago. Remember hymnals?

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They were books that you collected hymns in and

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there's a great old hymn that you won't find even in more recent hymnals written back in the middle

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of the 1800s that says, Every stormy wind that blows from every swelling tide of woes,

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there is a calm, a sure retreat, tis found beneath the mercy seat.

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Ah, whither could we flee for aid when tempted, desolate, dismayed? Or how the hosts of hell defeat

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had suffering saints no mercy seat. Thank God we have a mercy seat and we have a great high priest

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who stands there praying for us. So I don't have to feel alone because Jesus knows and prays for me.

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He knows you and even when you are too discouraged, too low, too much in pain

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to even pray for yourself, He prays for you. That's why you can make it through the tough times.

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What to do with the last day benefits? Just four very quick thoughts and for these I go to Hebrews

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chapter 10. Here's what we need to do now to take advantage of our benefits that we enjoy in this age.

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Since we have a great priest over the house of God, He says in chapter 10,

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since we live in this privileged time that we do, let us draw near to God. In other words,

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live near to God. This is no time, my friends, for us to be playing out in the pig pen of sin.

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This is no time for us to put up with backsliding in our lives. This is no time for us to be asleep

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at the switch. Let us draw near to God and live in consistent fellowship with Him.

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Secondly, He says, let us hold unswervingly to the hope we profess. In other words, hold on to your hope.

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Do not throw away your confidence. It will be richly rewarded. You need to persevere so that

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when you have done the will of God, you will receive what He's promised. For in just a very

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little while, He who is coming will come and will not delay. That's our hope, my friends.

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It is that hope that gives us perspective on everything else. Hold on to the hope that He

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has. Number three, He says, let us consider how we may spur one another on to love and good deeds.

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In other words, exist to encourage. Do not get focused on yourself in the last days. What is

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going to happen to me? How am I going to make it? Be looking around at others. Be a blessing to them.

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Encourage them to walk on with God. We need each other in this regard, and that brings me to the

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final point, and that is, He says, let us not give up. That is, let us not abandon meeting together

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like some do, but let us encourage one another. In other words, stay connected with others in God's

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family. Don't be casual about being in church. Don't be haphazard about being with others in

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a small group where you really get to know each other and connect. He says, hey, stay connected,

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and all the more as you see the day approaching, He says, the last days.

449
00:39:14,280 --> 00:39:22,600
Now, we have a choice. We can choose to live in fear. We can look at the last days and say,

450
00:39:22,600 --> 00:39:28,360
oh my goodness, what's going to happen? I'm so frustrated. I can't figure all of this out.

451
00:39:28,360 --> 00:39:33,880
This person says that. That person says something else. Who's right? What's going to happen?

452
00:39:33,880 --> 00:39:42,600
We can go down that road. Why? Why? We have the wonderful benefits we have living in these last

453
00:39:42,600 --> 00:39:48,600
days, and if we will simply do what He tells us to do, the result will be we will be fixed.

454
00:39:49,080 --> 00:39:54,520
We will be firm. We'll have a foundation that will take us all the way through the last days.

455
00:39:54,520 --> 00:40:04,280
And instead of having agitated hearts, our hearts can be still and know that He is God.

456
00:40:05,160 --> 00:40:11,080
Is that where your heart is today? At the end of the service, we're going to have some people who'll

457
00:40:11,080 --> 00:40:16,760
be up here to pray with you. And if you'd like to come and pray with some folks for something in

458
00:40:16,760 --> 00:40:24,200
your life, something that's troubling you and agitating your heart, please come. If you don't

459
00:40:24,200 --> 00:40:29,480
know Jesus as your Lord and Savior, I beg you to come and just say, would you pray for me? I need

460
00:40:29,480 --> 00:40:35,560
to take a step of faith. I need to become a follower of Christ. Right now, though, we're

461
00:40:35,560 --> 00:40:42,040
going to sing together after I've prayed. Father, thank you for what you say to us about the last

462
00:40:42,040 --> 00:40:51,560
days, and I pray that we will be so in touch with you, so walking with you, so near to you,

463
00:40:51,560 --> 00:40:56,840
that we will be so connected with others, so focused on encouraging others,

464
00:41:00,520 --> 00:41:08,520
that we'll be so tight with hanging on to our hope, that our hearts will be still, quiet,

465
00:41:09,240 --> 00:41:16,040
trusting as we live through this time that we're privileged to be a part of. Lord, help us to know

466
00:41:16,040 --> 00:41:24,280
what we're about, what our role is, and then to do it, and all the more so as the day approaches.

467
00:41:24,280 --> 00:41:46,520
Jesus' name, amen.