What If Jesus Came Today?

At the beginning of the 1900s there was a burst of exploration of the South Pole. The attempt on the part of several men to lead expeditions that would be the first to reach the South Pole. Names like Captain Robert Scott, Roald Amunson, the Norwegian who would actually be the first one at the South Pole. But then Sir Ernest Shackleton, a movie made about a daring rescue that Sir Ernest Shackleton led of his own ship on one of his efforts to become the first to reach the South Pole. He was shipwrecked, able to get his men to an island before his ship was crushed by ice flows near that island. He took a smaller ship off of a larger ship, told his men he would be back to get them, said he would go back to civilization, get fresh supplies, larger ship and promised that he would return to rescue his men. When he got back and he got near the island where they were, he found it closed in by ice. But suddenly there was an opening in the ice flows and he darted through that opening, got to the island and found his men on the shore ready to go. With all of their supplies, all of their things packed up, ready to go. Within the space of a half hour he was able to get them off the island, get out, to open sea again and when they were out of harm's way, he looked at his men and said, how was it that you were ready when I got there? How did you know that I was coming today? And the leader of the rescued party said to him, whenever the ice was clear, we thought it could be today. And we knew it would have to happen fast. And so we were always ready for you to come. The rescue of the crew of the endeavor has been made into a movie and was a daring rescue that made Sir Ernest Shackleton famous in England. Jesus, before he left his men, before he left to go back to heaven, promised that he would return. He said, you believe in God, believe also in me. Not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. And my father's house, our many mansions, if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go to prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto myself that where I am, there you may be also. Jesus promised to return. We call that return the rapture. Now the word rapture is not found in your Bible, but don't let that alarm you. Neither is the word Bible found in the Bible, neither is the word Trinity found in the Bible. But the concept of the rapture surely is found in the Bible. The word rapture comes from a Latin word, rapia, which means caught up. And the concept of being caught up surely is in the Bible. Paul said, for the Lord himself, shall the sin from heaven with a shout, with a voice of the Archangel, with the Trump of God and the dead in Christ shall rise first. And we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to be with the Lord. And so shall we ever be with the Lord. So we are caught up. The Bible speaks of us someday when Jesus comes back being caught up immediately, raptured. Now in your Bible, the rapture should be distinguished from the second coming of Christ. There's a difference in seven years between those two events. The rapture takes place before a time of tribulation on this earth, the second coming after the tribulation when Jesus comes back to set up His kingdom. In the rapture Jesus comes for His saints, for His church, the second coming He comes with the saints all the way to the earth. At the rapture Jesus comes to take us home to be with Him. At the second coming He comes to set up His kingdom on this earth. The rapture is not just a theological truth to enable us to fill out our prophetic charts. The rapture is what the Bible calls the blessed hope. It is that which motivates us and encourages us and gives us comfort and peace and challenge to live for Christ. That's the way Paul views the rapture in 1 Corinthians 15. Would you please locate that chapter in your Bible this morning? 1 Corinthians 15, where Paul describes the rapture in terms that bring us comfort and challenge. I want us to see this morning how Paul describes the rapture, the coming of Jesus for his bride, the church. First of all Paul describes it in verses 51 to 53 as a great change. He says, Listen, I tell you a mystery, verse 51, we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed in a flash in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet, for the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable and we will be changed, for the imperishable must clothe itself with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality. Twice Paul uses the word changed. We will be changed. The rapture is first of all described as a great change. Now notice Paul, first of all mentions the completeness of that change in verse 51. He says, Listen, I tell you a mystery. This is not a Sherlock Holmes story or a Stephen King thriller. That's not what he means by mystery. When Paul says I tell you a mystery, he's talking about something that has not been revealed in the Old Testament, but is now revealed to the apostles and prophets of the New Testament. So this is truth that was unknown before, but it is now known that it has been revealed to Paul. This is this mystery that I'm now revealing to you. God has revealed it to me and I'm giving it to you. And the mystery is this, we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed. I believe that's a wonderful theme for the nursery ministry. Probably ought to be on the top of the nursery doors. Brian, you might want to think about that. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed. What a comfort to parents to know that. If they would see that over the nursery doors. Well, I don't think that's the sleep that Paul is talking about. Certainly not the change he's talking about either. When Paul says we will not all sleep, he's using his favorite word for the death of a believer. Now, don't get it wrong. The soul does not go to sleep. There are those who teach that. It is only the body that goes to sleep. Paul says that to be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. So when a believer dies, immediately the real person, the soul, the spirit, the real you, goes to be with the Lord. The body just goes to sleep. And you know what sleep means? It means that you're going to temporarily lay down the rest and you expect to get that again. So when you lay down at night, when you go to sleep, you're going to get up in the morning. When you sleep in a church service, you're going to wake up when somebody says it's time for lunch. The sleep means that you temporarily rest. And so that's why Paul uses that word because for a believer, death is simply a temporary laying to rest of the body. So what Paul is saying is we will not all die before Jesus comes back. There will still be some who will be alive when Jesus comes back. But we will all, whether we die or whether we are still alive when he comes back, we will all be changed. Not all will die before the rapture, but all believers, all those who are in Christ, whether dead or alive, will be changed. Don't let anyone ever try to tell you there is such a thing as a partial rapture. You know, there are some people who teach that when Jesus comes back, if you're really right with God, walking with God filled with the Spirit, all those good things that you'll go, but if you're not really walking in obedience to the Lord, you're going to stay and be judged in the tribulation and you may go sometime later. The Bible does not teach a rapture, a partial rapture. Quite clearly Paul says the completeness of the rapture, we won't all die before it happens. Some of us will still be alive, but we will all, we will all be changed. And the reason why that happens is because Jesus is coming for the church as a whole. He is coming for His bride. That's the way the Bible speaks of us. We are Christ's bride and He's going to present us to Himself someday. He's coming to get us at the rapture. You don't see half a bride or three quarters of a bride. I love weddings. I really do. I love weddings. I love the rehearsal. I love the sense of anticipation. I love the excitement. I love the nervousness. Even the mother-in-law is okay. But I love weddings. They're just great. One thing that the point at the wedding where I really enjoy it the most is the point at which the bride appears at the back of the aisle and is ready to make her grand entrance. And when she starts down the aisle and the music is playing and everybody is looking at her, I always sneak a glance at the groom. The look on his face, the excitement in his eyes, and I've always been tempted to say to the groom, you better get a good look now. She'll never look this good again. I've been tempted to do that. Haven't done that. Of course, I could say the same thing to her about Him, right? He cleans up well, doesn't he? Probably we'll never look this good again. The bride is love that moment when the bride comes. One thing I've always noticed, such as she is, she is all there. There's no such thing as a half bride, three quarters of a bride. The bride is all there. And when Jesus comes for us, He's coming for His bride. He's coming to take us home to be with Him, to the Father's house, where He's prepared a place for us. We're going to have a marriage feast. We are His bride and so we are all going to be changed. All of us who know Christ, the completeness of that change, but then notice if you will, what Paul says in verse 52, about the suddenness of that change. He says this change will take place in verse 52 in a flash in the twinkling of an eye at the last trumpet for the trumpet will sound, the dead will be raised imperishable and we will be changed. He uses three expressions to indicate the suddenness of this change. He says first of all in a flash, it's the Greek word atmos, which is where we get our English word atom. The atom is the smallest particle of nature that can exist alone. We can split atoms, we can fuse atoms, but an atom is the smallest particle of nature that can exist on its own. So Paul is using a word which means the smallest particle of time that you can possibly imagine in a flash, in a moment, in an atmos, it will happen. And then in the twinkling of an eye, that word probably refers to the quick movement of the eye. The eye I am told, as I read, moves more quickly than any other part of the human body. We talk about the darting of the eyes, the quick movement of the eyes. King James says the twinkling of an eye, that idea of the quick darting of the eye from one side to the other or catching the glance of something out of the corner of your eye, that happens so quickly. That's how quickly, that's how suddenly Jesus will return. In a moment, in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, and then at the last trumpet, the third expression Paul uses for the suddenness of Christ's coming. At the last trumpet, Jesus will come. Now some people have tried to identify that trumpet with some trumpets in Revelation, and they've placed the rapture, the coming of Christ way up into the tribulation, but it's not talking about the same thing. In Jesus' returns, it's spoken of as the Trump of God, Paul says in 1 Thessalonians chapter 4, the trumpet of God. Trumpets in the book of Revelation are trumpets blown by angels. There are different things. I believe what Paul's doing here is he's using a very common expression that would be known to everybody in his audience who would be reading this letter or hearing it in the church in Corinth. The Roman army used a series of trumpet blasts to send signals to the army as it was camped in the fields. Obviously, they didn't have the technology that we have today to be able to send messages and signals and everybody knows what's going on. So, two types of communication were often used in ancient armies, including the Roman armies, and that would be flags that would signal different things or a series of trumpet blasts. And with the Roman army, they would have a series of three trumpet blasts whenever they were ready to pull up camp and move out. The first blast was to pull up your tent pegs back everything up. The second blast on the trumpet would mean fall in line, get ready to march, and the third and last trumpet would be march out. We're going. And I think Paul's using that kind of expression here, which would be very familiar to his readers. The idea of the last trumpet means we're out of here. We're gone. Now, you've already heard the first trumpet blast, which means to pull up your tent pegs out of this world and gather together with God's people, the second trumpet blast, get in line, make sure you're ready for Christ to come back. But there's coming a day when that last trumpet will sound, and when it does, we're marching out. We're leaving. There will be no time to get ready. Paul's whole point in these three expressions, in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. His whole point is that the rapture will take place quickly, suddenly, there will be no time to get ready. Don't fool yourself in the thinking that when Jesus returns, you'll have a long time to get ready. Oh, I think something's happening. I believe it's Jesus coming. Well, let me take care of this or that or the other. No, no, my friend, you won't have time to do that. It's going to happen in the smallest particle of time you can imagine. It will happen in the very moment it takes your eye to catch something out of the corner of your eye. It will happen at that last trumpet blast, and it will be done. It will happen that suddenly. So Paul emphasizes the completeness of this change, the suddenness of this change, but notice also the reason for this change, verse 53. Here's the reason why we must all be changed as he ends verse 52 with four or because the perishable must clothe itself with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality. What's he talking about there? Please talk about the human body. We live in a perishable mortal body, a body that is slowly decaying, in the case of some of us quickly, decaying, but a body that is decaying, that is perishing, and a body that is mortal, that means it's going to die. That's what we live with. We live in a body that is decaying and dying, and the older we get, the more we realize that, right? You know, as the old saying goes, you get to the point that whatever ain't hurting, ain't working. You know, one or the other. You get to a point where you realize this body was not made to live forever in this form on this earth. It just wasn't intended to do that. Obviously, when Jesus, or when God created us, it was intended that way, but man's fall into sin changed all of that, and the body became corruptible, decaying, dying body. So we cannot exist forever in these bodies, and decaying and dying bodies cannot exist in a perfect place, heaven. And so the reason that we must be changed is because we have to have a new body. Aren't you glad you're going to get a new body someday? No, I'm glad. Glad I'm going to get a new body someday. I've rarely been sick in my life. In the last eight months of 2009, I was in the hospital four times, and I'm thinking, okay, now they're getting their money's worth out of me. You know, we get to a point where our bodies begin to break down and things stop working as well as they should. So I'm becoming more and more thankful that I'm getting a new body someday. When we all get to heaven, we will have a new body. We will be with Christ in an imperishable, incorruptible, non-dicating, non-dying body. That's the reason for the change. So Paul describes the rapture as a time of great change, but secondly, he describes it also as a great victory. Notice if you will, verse 54. When the perishable has been clothed with the imperishable and the mortal with immortality, then the saying that is written will come true, death has been swallowed up in victory, quotes from Isaiah 25. Verse 55. Where old death is your victory? Where old death is your sting? The sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law, but thanks be to God. He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. Three times in these four verses, Paul uses the word victory. So obviously as emphasis here is, the rapture is a great victory. Notice again if you will, the cry of victory in verses 54 and 55. He says, when this event happens, when we receive a body that is immediately changed to be like Christ's at the rapture, when this happens, death will be swallowed up in victory and there will be this great cry that will arise in verse 55. Where old death is your victory? Where old death is your sting? I can't prove this. I don't know if this will happen this way, but I kind of like to believe that this verse gives two cries of two different groups of people at the rapture. The first cry, where old death or where old grave is your victory? I believe may well be the cry of those who come out of the grave. You thought you had me. You thought you had won the victory. Where old grave? Where old death is your victory? Those who come forth out of the grave may well utter that cry as they ascend heavenward with the Lord. And then those of us who are still alive, those of us who still remain who are caught up together with them in the clouds may well utter that second cry of victory. Where old death is your sting? Because those of us who live until the coming of Christ will not have to experience the sting of death. We will escape death and a taunting cry. We will utter as we go to be with the Lord. Where old death is your sting? I've often thought and have been reminded so much of it in recent days. When I'm walking toward a grave side, I often think of this verse. And what a wonderful time it would be right then and there for Jesus to come back. And to be a part of seeing bodies come up out of the grave and hear that cry of theirs, where old grave is your victory. And then to be a part of that group that's caught up and utter that cry of where old death is your sting. What a great time that would be to witness the rapture. That's going to happen all over this world when Jesus comes back. There will be a great cry of victory that will ascend as Jesus takes home his people, some who come forth out of the graves, some who are alive and are instantly changed to be like him. And that great cry of victory will be uttered. But notice Paul also talks about the completeness of that victory. Verse 56, the sting of death is sin and the power of sin is the law. He seems to bring in a couple of other issues that don't really at first glance seem to belong here. He's been talking about death and resurrection through this whole passage and then all of a sudden he brings in sin and the law. What does that have to do with what we're talking about? Well you see, sin and the law are very closely tied to death. It was Adam's sin that brought death into the human experience. Paul talks about it in Romans 5-12 for by one man sin entered the world. And death by sin so that death came upon all men for that all have sinned, he says. You see, it is sin that introduced death to the human race. So sin and death are very closely tied together. And it is the law that makes us aware of our sin. That's the purpose of the law. Romans 3-19 says to shut every mouth, to take care of all of our excuses, to show us that we are not innocent, we are guilty. The law shows us our sin and then the law condemns us to death because of our sin. It is the law that tells us you are worthy of death. The condemnation of the law is very closely tied to death. And so these three are coming to a bundle. Death, sin and the law, they all come together. And so there is no victory over death unless there is also victory over sin and the law. And that's why Paul introduces them here. They are all interrelated but that leads me to Paul's third point about this great victory and that is the cause of the victory in verse 57. But thanks be to God, He gives us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ. The victory over death comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. The victory over sin comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. The victory over the law comes through the Lord Jesus Christ. All of it comes through Christ. My friend, if you don't have Christ, you don't have any of this. If you're just a religious person, if you're just a good moral person, but you've never come to the foot of the cross and realize your need for Christ, then you don't have the kind of victory we're talking about. For you see, it is Jesus Christ who conquered death by his own death on the cross. It is Christ who conquered sin by his death on the cross. He paid for your sin. He took care of all of your sin. He paid the penalty for it. My sin, everybody's sin. He paid for it. The victory over sin comes only through Christ. And it is Christ who gives us victory over the condemnation of the law. Paul says it this way in Colossians chapter 2. In verse 14, having canceled the written code with its regulations that was against us and that stood opposed to us, he took it away, nailing it to his cross. Jesus took away that code of the law that was against us, that condemned us, that said, you're worthy of death because you can't measure up to God's standards. Jesus took it away and nailed it to his cross so that it no longer can condemn us. My friend, the glorious message of the gospel is this. That Jesus took care of the law's condemnation of you. Neither is their condemnation anymore to those who are in Christ Jesus. There's no more condemnation to those in Christ, Paul says in Romans 8. The law is nailed to the cross. Its condemning power over you is destroyed. It is annulled. And by that very same act of dying on the cross, Jesus paid for your sin and he conquered death, the victory comes through Jesus Christ. There is no other way to have victory over death, sin and the law. And so everyone in this room this morning needs to make sure that you know Christ as your Savior. It's not enough to be a good person. It's not enough to be a law-biting citizen or a good moral provider for your family. It's not enough to have been baptized or be a member of a church. If you've never realized that you in your heart and life are a sinner and that you need Jesus Christ who died for your sins on the cross to be your Savior. If you've never bowed the need to Him and said, I will submit to His Lordship and I will trust Him as my Savior. If you've never done that, my friend, then you will not have this victory over death. You see, when you come to death's door, there's only one thing that will give you peace and comfort. And that is knowing that you know Christ, the only thing that makes the difference. Francis Voltaire, the French agnostic philosopher who tried to do away with the Bible in France on his deathbed, turned to his doctor and said, I will give you half of what I'm worth if you'll give me six more months of life. He was frantic as he approached death. The one who had spent a lifetime trying to do away with God in the Bible now realized he had nothing to hold on to as he lay dying. By contrast, Adniram Judson, missionary to Burma, would say on his deathbed, I go with the gladness of a boy bounding away from school. I feel so strong in Christ. Those of you who have been with family members who have gone into the presence of the Lord know the difference it makes to no Christ. I saw it again two weeks ago with John K. Hill. As I asked him, was he understanding what the doctor was saying, was he okay with that? And he pointed upward and said, I'm okay with him. So I'm okay with what's happening. You can't face death that way unless you know Christ. If you don't know Christ, there is no victory over death, the condemnation of the law, the penalty of sin. It is only Christ which can help you meet that moment when you pass into eternity. Do you know Christ? Do you know Him? That's the key question everyone in this room ought to be asking this morning. Do you know Christ? No Christ is my savior. The cause of this victory is Christ Himself and what He's done for us. So the rapture is a great change. It's a great victory but Paul speaks of it in one more way in verse 58 and that is it is a great motivation. The rapture is a great motivation. Verse 58, therefore my dear brothers. In other words, because of what I've just described to you, because of the rapture, he gives three commands. Stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. So the rapture, because of the rapture, we should be motivated in these three areas, Paul says. First of all, there should be a motivation to purity. That word stand firm, two words. That's a great way of word in the New Testament which is always used of standing firm morally, of moral purity and the rapture ought to be a motivation for us to be morally pure. We face great attack in our culture today, not only across the board in the culture but on believers as well in regard to moral purity. The greatest threat to marriages today asks Jim Simmons who does a lot of counseling. The greatest threat to marriages today is internet pornography. It's a subject that we don't like to talk about in the church but because we push it underground, it is rampant. The compromise of moral purity in the church itself is appalling. And by the way ladies, before you begin to shake your fingers too hard at the men, what about those soap operas and romance novels and chat rooms? Just as much destruction is done through those kinds of things as with the men engaging in internet pornography. To a great degree today we have compromised ourselves morally. John says this in 1 John 3 about this very issue. He says dear friends, now we are the children of God and what we shall be has not yet been made known but we know that when he shall appear we shall be like him for we shall see him as he is. He's talking about being changed to be like Christ. Now here's the motivation. Everyone who has this hope in him purifies himself even as he is pure. If you have the hope of Christ in you you'll want to live a pure life morally because you know that Jesus could come back at any moment. Occasionally, Jeanne in relationship to her work at the college has had to go away for a conference or a seminar to find out what the government's changing now about financial aid. And so at those times it gets really messy around our house. I'm the kind of guy that if I'm left to myself I don't see the need to make up the bed in the morning. I mean if it's just going to sit there all day and not be of any use and the next time it's used you're going to pull the covers down anyway. Why not just leave them down? They just make a perfect sense to me. So the bed doesn't get made. Dishes have a tendency to pile up in the sink. Whatever dishes I'm capable of using end up in the sink quite often. Close, somehow don't make it into the dirty clothes hamper. They end up on the floor. Tows are not properly straightened on the towel racks. It gets really messy around our house when Jeanne is gone. But you know what happens the night before she's going to come back? You do, don't you. Some of you are the same way. The last time that happened to me was I think last spring Jeanne was gone for five days and she was to arrive home at seven o'clock on Friday evening. I always find out exactly what time. And so I got off from the college. I left the college about five o'clock thinking I had two hours to get things presentable for her to come back to the home. And as I pull in the driveway she's walking in the front door. I was caught. There were dishes in the sink. The bed was not made, etc., etc. Well that's what's going to happen when Jesus returns, you see. We're not going to have any advanced warning. We're not going to know it's going to be Friday at seven o'clock. No. We don't know when he's coming back. But when he does come back. We need to be living pure, standing firm as Paul says here. So that we are ready when he comes back. In our lives morally the dishes are clean. Tows are straight, clothes where they ought to be. The bed is made. So the rapture is a great motivation to moral purity. Secondly, it's a great motivation to faithfulness. He says, let nothing move you. Because of the rapture, let nothing move you. The idea is to be moved or to shift oneself, to be moved away from a firm devotion to Christ. What does it take to move you? What does it take to get you to stop coming to church or to get you to stop reading your Bible or to get you to stop praying or to get you to stop living faithfully for Christ in your personal life? How much does it take to move you off of those spiritual disciplines that reflect your love for Christ? How faithful are you? In your own walk of Christ. You see, this is the point. If Jesus is coming back today and He may, how faithful are we? How quickly are we moved away from our devotion to Him? The rapture is a motivation to faithfulness and then thirdly Paul says, the rapture is a motivation to service. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. I love the way Paul says it here. Give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord. That means eagerly, nobody has to twist my arm when I see a need, when I see an opportunity. If I have the opportunity and the ability to do that, I'm going to jump in. I want to be eager to serve Christ. But not only does he say fully, give yourselves fully, says always give yourselves fully. You know if you're like me, it's easy to go and spurt. For six months, really on fire and then drop off for a while. But Paul says, if we believe that Jesus could come back at any time, that ought to cause us to want to give ourselves fully to the work of the Lord and to always give ourselves fully to be consistent and regular in that zeal and earnest giving ourselves to serve Christ. That doesn't mean that everybody in the church can jump into every ministry, but it does mean that all of us need to be involved in the work of the Lord somehow, fully giving ourselves and are focused on energy eagerly serving Christ in some way and doing that consistently always, not just in spurt, because Jesus could come back today. Jesus could come back. The rapture is a great change. We will be changed to be like Christ. It's a great victory as we rise heavenward. We will cry out that victory over the grave and over death, but it is also a great motivation to moral purity, to faithfulness, to service for Christ. I want to ask you a question in closing this morning. If Jesus were to show up here today, I don't think this is going to happen, but if Jesus were to show up here today in this service and say to you, I'm going to come back to take you home to heaven in 24 hours. 24 hours, I'll be back. What would you do in the next 24 hours? Is there something you would change? Is there a sin that you would confess? Is there a neighbor you would want to go witness to that you've been thinking about and God's been speaking to your heart about, laying burden on your heart about, coworker? Is there some relationship with a family member that you'd want to get on the phone, get that thing cleared up? Or maybe another person in the body of Christ, you haven't spoken to in a long time, you're at odds with them. Is that something you'd want to clean up in the next 24 hours? Is there anything you'd want to make sure was ready? What would you see? The point is, Jesus is not going to give us 24 hour notice. Remember, He's going to come back suddenly. And when He does, we need to be ready. And so just like Ernest Shackleton's men, we need to be ready, on shore, packed up, ready for the ship to come in. At any moment, because it could happen anytime. And so moral purity, zealous service for Christ, firm faithfulness to Christ needs to be a part of our daily lives, constantly living that way so that we are ready whenever Jesus comes back. Are you ready if Jesus were to come back today? Would you join me in prayer, please? Or help us to understand what it will be like when you return? Help us to know that it will happen quickly and will not have time to get ready. I pray that we'll be ready today, should it happen today. Father, I pray that if there's anyone here in this audience today that is not sure that they know Christ, that today they will make sure that they're saved, that they've trusted Christ who died for their sins and to release them from the condemnation of the law. I pray, Father, if there are those of us as your children who are not ready for you to come back, that we will find ourselves living, we will make sure that we get our lives right with you and we're living in a way that is pleasing to you. In Jesus' name we pray, even so, come quickly Lord Jesus. Amen.