1 Thessalonians chapter 5. I took the title from verse 9. For God hath not appointed us
to wrath. That right there ought to just
make our day. There are some that are appointed to God's wrath. And he says here that God has
not appointed us to wrath, but to obtain salvation by our Lord
Jesus Christ. Appointed to obtain salvation. Now Paul continues here in this
chapter. Of course, when this was written,
it wasn't written in chapter and verses, it was just a letter.
But he continues for the next 11 verses here, on the Lord's
return. He had spoken to them back in
chapter 4 there about the Lord's return and how He would bring
those who had fallen asleep in Him, that He would bring them
with Him when He comes. And he's continuing on this theme
of the Lord's return. He's written about this to comfort
the hearts of His children, of God's children. Our hearts and
our minds ought to be set on His return. We should be looking
for His return. As I read this and sitting in
the study, I thought to myself, am I really looking with expectation
for the Lord to return? I think most of us look to just
die. We look to grow old and die. But you know, it's just as probable
that the Lord could come. as it is that I could die. One
or the other is going to happen first. One's going to happen
or the other. And I want to live my life, what's
left of it, looking for His return, looking for Him. Looking for
Him whom my soul loves, as the lady said in the Song of Solomon,
have you seen Him whom my soul loveth? So Paul writes this to
comfort the heart of God's children, and especially those whose hearts
have been broken over loved ones that have died, and he's encouraging
them to go on in the faith. And as they go on in the faith,
they go on expecting the Lord to return. And he writes about
the Lord's return, not to satisfy curiosity, but to encourage the
Lord's children. He says here in verse 1, But
of the times and seasons, brethren, you have no need that I write
unto you. The Word of God is not written
to satisfy curiosity. It is written for our learning,
not for our curiosity. We do not need to know the times
We do not need to know the season when the Lord shall return. Do
we need to know that? Here's what we need to know.
Him. We need to know the one who is
returning. I remember very well, before
I heard the gospel and I was religious, I was just taken up
with prophecy. I was taking up on Armageddon
and the Tribulation and all this. That just had my attention until
I heard the gospel. And when I heard the gospel,
that stuff went to the wayside. Now the Tribulation, all that
stuff, I don't know anything about it. But I do know one thing,
I know Jesus Christ. I know how God saves sinners,
and I know how this sinner can stand before God complete. And that's what I need to know.
I need to know the One who saves. I need to know the One who rules
and reigns over all. That's what I need to know. I
need to know Him. And Paul says, of the times and
the seasons, you don't really need to know that. But what you
do need to know is Him. And listen, we cannot exhaust
the knowledge of Jesus Christ. We cannot exhaust knowing the
Lord Jesus Christ. He is the wisdom of God. You cannot exhaust infinite wisdom. There's no searching of it. You cannot search it out. You
cannot come to the end of it. It's infinite. It's unsearchable. And I know there's men who built
their whole ministry on prophecy. I was thinking of Jack Van Impey
and those guys. They just constantly get their
attention with what's going on here in the world and how it
fits in the Bible. Our ministry here is built on
the Lord Jesus Christ, the cornerstone. He's the foundation. We're not
going to build on anything else. We're going to build on the Lord
Jesus Christ. The believer is not so much concerned
with a time and a season as he is concerned with his relationship
with the Lord. And as I grow older, and as I
have watched others grow older that I've known for years, I
realize, and especially being the pastor here, I realize the
most important thing For you and me is our relationship with
Christ. That's the most important thing.
Mary has chosen that one thing needful, and that was to sit
at the Master's feet and learn from the Master. That's the most
important thing. The believer knows that the day
of the Lord, the day of His coming in which He will be admired of
all them that believe, the day when He shall appear as King
of kings and Lord of lords, the day when faith shall give way
to sight, the day when He shall gather in His elect from all
over the earth, when this happens, when this day happens, it's going
to happen, Paul said, like a thief in the night. It's going to happen
like that. You know, we were broken into
over here not too long ago. Our car was broken into here
a few weeks ago. You know, we didn't, we didn't know that guy.
We didn't know who it was or what was going on. You know,
we got up the next morning. Next thing we knew, our doors
was open and trunk was open and a thief in the night had come.
We didn't know it at all. It just, that quick. It was in
and out. And when the Lord comes, He says,
it's going to be like a thief in the night, unexpected, suddenly,
and swiftly. It's going to be that fast. That
fast. And it will happen, listen, He
tells us here in verse 3, it will happen when the unbelieving
world cries, peace, peace, when they think that all is well,
all is safe, and everything is just starting to look rosy. He
said, then sudden destruction is going to come. Sudden destruction
is going to come. You know, if you turn on the
television, say, in the morning, and all of a sudden, the Middle
East is at peace with each other, and Russia, and China, and the
United States, and North Korea, and wherever. Everybody's at
peace. And you know what? Everyone's going to see this
and say, man, that's great. That's great. But the believer,
I think, who's in tune with the Scriptures, is going to realize
this is coming to an end. This is coming to an end. When
the world is at peace and they're crying, peace, peace, and all,
he said, that's when sudden destruction is going to come. That's when
it's going to happen. And he says, it's going to come
upon them and they shall not escape. Eternal destruction. I can't
put this into words. I cannot put into words the eternal
destruction of the soul." We don't die like animals. The
Scripture says that the beast dies and goes downward to the
earth, and the man dies and his spirit goes upward to God who
gave it. Once a person comes into this
world, that person is forever. Now that person is either going
to be with the Lord, or he's going to be in torment. It's
just one or the other. One or the other. And he's telling
us here there's going to be eternal destruction. The wrath of God
is coming upon them. It's deserved wrath. It's wrath
warned of. They've been warned of it. You
know, when Noah built the ark, 120 years, the people there In that area, they were warned,
the flood is coming. The flood is coming. Noah, what
are you doing? What are you building? I'm building
an ark. God told me to build an ark. He's going to flood this
place. He's going to wipe out all flesh.
And they didn't believe him. Only eight souls were on that
ark. Only eight out of all those people that lived around there.
All of them. I assure you that when the flood
came, when Noah was put in the ark, and all that was in the
ark, I assure you when the flood came, they started running to
that ark. I guarantee you those people who lived around there
started running to that ark and trying to hang on to the outside
of that ark. I have no doubt people were trying to hang on
to the outside of that ark. But salvation is not on the outside
of Christ. It's in Christ. Those in the
ark were saved. Those outside the ark, they perished
in the flood of God's wrath. God is already, at one time,
He has already given a sample now, just a sample of His anger
and wrath against sin. He's already given that. He gave
the greatest of it at Calvary. The greatest example of it is
Calvary. when he put his own son to death, tormented him. But he says here, when this unbelieving
world cries peace, peace, he said that's when the sudden destruction's
gonna come. And he gives two examples. He
said it's gonna be like a thief in the night. And it's going
to be like a woman who's in birth pain. She's a woman who's with
child. And all of a sudden, you know,
it's just all of a sudden it's like, oh, the pain happens all
of a sudden. This pain of birth comes upon
them. The two things I see here, the
thief in the night is this, loss of all earthly possessions. When you die, what do you plan
on taking with you? Absolutely nothing. Not any of
these earthly possessions anyway. Nothing. When we think of a thief,
we think of the loss of earthly possessions. They come and they
steal and take them away. And then when he gives this example
of a woman in birth pains, it is pain that is felt inward,
It is felt pain. It is real pain. It is pain that
comes as a result of the curse. That's what God said to Eve.
I'm going to multiply your pain in childbearing because of what
she did. And He said, it's going to come
like a thief in the night and it's going to be painful. Painful
for the unbelieving world. Because He says in verse 4, here
comes the good news. Here comes the good news. You
gotta have bad news to get to the good news. You gotta have
the truth. You have to have the truth. The
truth of what it is to be lost and the truth of what it is to
be saved. And he says in verse four, but you brethren, you're
not in darkness. At one time, I was in darkness.
At one time, you were in darkness, but he says you're not anymore.
You're not in darkness. You are children of light. You've
been taught of God, and you are looking. You are looking for the Lord
Jesus Christ to come and put an end to all this. And the sooner,
the better. The sooner, the better. I say,
as John said, come quickly, Lord Jesus. I tell you, when you look at
this world, it's just pain and sorrow and evil. The whole world, the Scripture
says, and I've learned this as I've gotten older. I've learned
the truth of it. The whole world lieth in wickedness. There's not one part on this
globe that's not full of wickedness. Not one part. He says this, But you, brethren,
are not in darkness, that that day will not overtake you as
a thief. It's not going to overtake you. It will not be, listen, listen
to this, this is good. I was thinking about this today.
It will not be, that day when the Lord returns, it will not
be a painful day for you. Will it? It won't be, it will
not be a painful day for you. And it won't be a day of loss.
You see, the thief comes and he takes what's not his, he takes
away your possessions. But now when the Lord comes and
gets his people, it's not lost. We're not losing, we're gaining.
We are gaining. We have everything to gain when
our Lord comes to take us home. And it won't be a day, a surprising
day. It will not be a day of surprise
because you expect him to return, right? You know, if you're expecting
someone to show up, you know, if someone has called you and
said, I'm going to be there, you know, Saturday, and when
they show up, you don't open the door and say, I can't believe
you're here. Well, I just told you I was going to be here, didn't
I? I called you. When you see Him, you open the door and you
just embrace Him. You're expecting Him to show up. And we have the
Word of God that tells us He's showing up. He's coming. I like to think of it like this. He's on His way. He's on His
way. He's coming. It will not be a day of surprise
for you, not if you're looking for Him. You, he says in verse
5, you are all children of light. Light. You know, we have light. I can see everything going on
in here. I see you, I see what's going on in here. I have light.
If you've been illuminated, if the Holy Spirit is in you, you
have light, you have understanding. You understand the Lord's coming. You're children of light, you're
of the day, you're not of the night. You're not in religious
darkness anymore. Aren't you glad God saved you
out of religion? It's kind of like you feel like
you've been double saved. Saved from your wretched self and saved
from being religious and lost. That's what it's like. Being
safe and just being religious. You're not in religious darkness
anymore. You've been translated from the kingdom of darkness
into the kingdom of light, into the kingdom of God's dear Son,
what it says over in Colossians. We are not of the night nor of
darkness. Now, there was a time we were
of the night. There was a time we liked it when night time came.
It just suited our character. But not now. Not now. Not now. We are not of the night, he says,
nor of darkness. We are not spiritually ignorant
no more. I feel for people, I feel for
those who go to church, that's the only way I know to say it
that you understand what I'm saying, and they play these games. They just have games and events
and all kinds of stuff, and all they are doing is entertaining
people on their way to hell. I was asked by when I was getting
my hair cut if we were going to hunt Easter eggs this Sunday. I wanted a good haircut, so I
didn't say a whole lot. You know, you wait till that
stuff's over with for you. I think it was like Scott Richardson
one time was getting to be operated on. The doctor was asking him
about what he believed, and he said, let's talk about it afterwards. Let's get this done first. Easter eggs. She said, are y'all doing anything
for Easter? I said, yeah, we're gonna preach
the gospel, but no, we're not playing games. We worship Christ. We worship
a risen Christ. We do not worship an event that
happened 2,000 years ago. We don't worship an event. That's
what he said to Martha and Mary after Lazarus died. He said,
your brother's gonna rise again. And they said, we know he's going
to rise again in the resurrection. He said, you're looking at the
resurrection. If you keep looking for an event, you're gonna miss
Christ. He said, I'm the resurrection. We're not looking for an event.
We're looking for the one who is the resurrection. And that's
what he's talking about here on his return. We're not looking
for an event. That's why you don't need to know the times
of the season, because this is exactly what will happen. We'll
start looking at the calendar. We'll start looking at the calendar,
and the next thing you know, we're going to be marking on
the calendar. This is going to happen today. We'll forget about
the one coming. We'll just look at what's going
to happen. He says here, We are not of the
night, nor of the darkness. You know who God is, and you
know that He is being worshipped in spirit and in truth. Therefore,
verse 6, seeing this is so, that is, therefore, let us not sleep
as do others. This is a different type of sleep.
He first spoke over in chapter 4 of those who sleep in Jesus. They have died to this world,
they've passed on, they're with the Lord. But here, this is a
sleep of death right here. This is a sleep of death. Let
us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and be sober. Here's
our attitude and this is our conduct till He comes. Right
here, we have it. We have it. Like I said last
week, they didn't have the Bible, they didn't have what we have.
They were just paganism. And now he's giving them instructions
on how to walk and live and conduct themselves. And he's saying here,
let us not sleep as do others, but let us watch and be sober.
Be sober. Don't be as the unconverted who
look not at eternal matters, everything we do. Henry said
this one time in a message. He said, every time we sign a
contract, we are to sign it on the lid of our casket. Because
that's where you're going. That's where it's going to end up. Let's not be as the unconverted
who look not at eternal matters, who care not about their soul's
well-being, who do not believe God. They live for the day. They live for the day. They live
for enjoyment. That's why amusement parks are
so popular. We like to be entertained. We like to be entertained. Who
makes the most money in this country? The entertainers. The entertainers. Let us not sleep the sleep of
indifference and lukewarmness. Let's not sleep in the sleep
of indifference or lukewarmness. You know, there's something here
about sleep. When a person sleeps, that person is unconscious. That person is unaware with what's
going on around them. They're inactive. They don't
know what's going on at all. One writer said this that I was
reading today. He said, when we sleep, we live in a dream
world. We live in a dream world. And in that world, we have no
control over our thoughts. They just run rampant. And that's what he's saying here.
Don't you be like those who sleep. They're unaware. They live in
unawareness of God. They live in unawareness of God.
The one thing that I pray that you and I will do, and that's
live, and I don't know any other way to put it, but to live God
conscious in His presence. In His presence. Thou God seest
me. He says here, let us not sleep
like they do, let us not fall into a spiritual stupor and become
careless in our walk with Christ, in our relationship with the
Lord Jesus Christ. He says here, but let us watch,
be on the watch, be on the watch, be awake, be awake. Remember when the Lord went to
the Garden of Gethsemane And he told the disciples to watch
while he'd go pray, and he'd come back, and what was going
on? Sleep. He said, what? Couldn't you watch
with me one hour? And then he woke them up, and then he goes
and prayed again, and come back, and they was asleep again. Well, the Psalm 121, the God
of Israel neither slumbers nor sleeps. I'm not sure of that
Psalm, but I know it's in the Psalms. But the God who keeps
Israel, our Lord, never slumbers nor sleeps. When you and I, tonight,
we go home, and we lay down and we go to sleep, He's watching
over us. That angel guard that we sang
about, that angel guard watches over us. He says, Be awake, let us watch
over our hearts, for out of it are the issues of life, Solomon
said to his son, Son, give me thine heart. Give me thine heart. Listen,
a man is what he is in his heart, not what he says he is. I'm not
what I say I am. I am what I am in my heart. What
my heart is, that's me. What my heart is after, that's
me. Where your treasure is, your heart is. That's what you're
after. That's what you will spend your
time thinking your mind will be on. Your mind will be on that. Your heart will be set on that. That's why the scripture says,
set your heart, your mind on things above, where Christ sits
at God's right hand. And let us watch over our thoughts. Spurgeon had a sermon one time
I read, it's been a long time ago, thoughts about thoughts.
Thoughts about thoughts. You know, our mind is not something
that's just emotional. I know a lot of times it's like
it's kicked out of gear. But what goes through my mind,
we ought to have some control over. You know, I know thoughts
pop in your head, but you can say, well, hold on now. I know
that's not good. I know that's not a good thought.
That's not going to lead to anything good. That's why he says to bring
every thought into subjection to the Lord Jesus Christ. And let us watch over the snares
of Satan in the world. It's written in John Bunyan,
Pilgrim's Progress, stay away from the enchanted ground. He
was warned to stay away from the enchanted ground. And while we're watching, let
us most of all watch for our Lord's return. And be sober,
spiritually minded, that's what it means, be spiritually minded.
Not taking up too much with the affairs of this life. I know
we live in this world, I know we've got to work in it, and
we have friends and people we meet and things we do, Don't be overly taken up with
it. That's what he's saying. Don't be overly taken up with
this. The affairs of this life. Be serious about your relationship
with the Lord Jesus Christ. That's what he's telling these
Thessalonians and us now. Be very serious about your relationship
with Jesus Christ. And he says in verse 7, For they
that sleep, sleep in the night. They sleep, what he's saying
here, they sleep in darkness. They have no light. It's natural to them to sleep
in darkness. And they that be drunken are
drunken in the night. Drunkenness is the opposite of
being sober. It's the opposite. It is excess. That's why he's talking here
about excess. Don't be caught up in excess with any of this
life. Drunkenness is lack of control.
I believe that Solomon says something about the man who has no control
over his spirit is like a city whose walls are broken down.
You have no control over yourself. It's a work of darkness that drunkenness comes from.
He's talking here. Now listen too. This thing of drunkenness is
not just being drunk with wine. He's talking about being drunk
with the world. You can be drunk with power.
You can be drunk with yourself. You can be drunk with anything.
It doesn't have to be wine. You can be drunk with worldliness,
material gain, popularity. You're just drunk with it. That's
why these athletes can't give it up. You have to run them off.
They're drunk with this applause that they get. They get all these
applause for years and years, and they're great. And it's like,
after a while, it's like, would you guys go sit down? You can't
even hit the basket no more. But they want that applause.
They're drunk with it. They're drunk with it. After
many years, they believe their own hype. You can be drunk with a lot of
things besides wine. And those who are given to this
and walk after it will not see God. But let us who are of the
day be sober, sober in our thoughts and our minds and our judgments
and our steps, our direction we're going. You know, a drunken
man, he can't walk a straight line. He can't walk a straight
line. He gets so drunk, he don't know
where he's going. I was at a, stayed at a motel here sometime,
it's been a few years ago. I had a drunk man come in and
knocking, trying to get in the door, you know, just, the door,
it was the wrong room, it's my room. He had no idea where he
was at, he didn't know where his room was. He said, let us not walk like
that. We are of the day. We are to be sober. We are to
be sober-minded and fellowship with those who are sober-minded. Fellowship with those who are
sober-minded. We are told in the Scriptures to cast off the
works of darkness. Putting on, he says, the breastplate
of faith and love. Put it on! Can you put all faith? Yeah, unbelief. That's putting
all faith, isn't it? When you don't believe. When
you doubt. How many times did our Lord say
to His disciples, O faithless, O faithless. He said here, put on faith and
love. Wear it like a garment. Wear
it like a breastplate, like a, you know, when you're going into
battle, if you're gonna go into battle, and you've seen this
on television, and some of you may have been in wars, but you
got a protection. They had a breastplate back,
especially when this was written. They went into battle with a
breastplate so that the spears and swords and stuff couldn't
penetrate so easily. To protect what? The vitals.
The vitals. When he says, put on the breastplate
of faith and love, what does he talk about protected? Your
heart, your vitals, which is your heart. Faith and love will
protect the heart. Wear it. He said, wear it. Put it on and keep it on. Don't
take it off. We're in a war and every soldier
needs armor, and our armor is faith and love. Faith, love,
and hope. That's our armor. It's our armor. These protect the heart. Satan,
John Bunyan wrote a book called Mansoul, A Holy War. Satan is after Mansoul. Satan,
you and I know we don't realize this, because God protects us
so much. He protects us so much that there's
a lot we don't ever see and realize. Just like you protect your children
when it's growing up, you protected them from a lot of things, didn't
you? There's a lot of things you didn't want them to see.
You turned TV off, you don't want them to watch that. There's
a lot of things you didn't want them to see. There's a lot of
things God doesn't let us see. There's things He lets us see,
but there's a lot more evil than you and I have ever touched and
ever witnessed. And Satan is after our soul. He's after our soul. If God would allow him, if need
be, he'd make you rich. Whatever he needs to get your
soul. Look what he did to our Lord. He took him and offered
him the kingdoms of the world. He said, I'll give all of these
to you if you'll bow down and worship me. Well, he's a liar
anyway. Anything that comes out of his
mouth is a liar. The kingdoms belong to our Lord.
God never turned this over to him. He's just a pit bull on
a chain, that's all he is. But he's after the soul. And
our weapon against him are not carnal weapons. How can they
be? You can't see him. You can't see him. He'd walk
right in this door and you'd never know it. You'd never see him. Never
see him. He's a spirit. He could walk right in, sit right
down beside you, and you wouldn't even know it. Our weapons are not carnal. They're
spiritual. They're faith, hope, and love. We believe God. When He tempted
our Lord, what did our Lord do? Every time He quoted the Word
of God, it is written. It's written. It's written. How
important is it for you and I to be in the Word of God so we can
know when to use it, how to use it, just like our Lord did? He said, it's written. Well,
if you're never in the Word of God, you don't know what's written.
That, to me, is so important that we be saturated with the
Word of God, because there's the foundation of faith. Everything
we believe comes from the Word of God. Everything God has to say to
us comes from His Word. Faith believes God and takes
Him at His Word. Love is the bond between God
and His children and between the children. It keeps them together. It fortifies the soul. It keeps
the fiery darts from entering the heart and destroying the
work of God. Let me ask you something. Is faith and love enough? It is if God gave it to you. If it's of God, it's enough.
And for a helmet, the hope of salvation. Job said this. Job
had his helmet on. He had the helmet on. He said,
I know my Redeemer liveth. Though these skin worms destroy
my body, yet in my flesh I'll see God. Though He slay me, yet
will I trust Him." He had his helmet on, didn't he? Every soldier needs a helmet.
And the believer's helmet is the hope of salvation. You can't
beat a man who has hope. If you want to beat somebody,
destroy their hope. destroy it. If you can destroy their hope,
you got them. If you can't destroy their hope, that fight's going
to keep on going. It's not going to stop. The expectation of being saved
when all this is over What a hope. And another place is called a
good hope through grace. God has not appointed us to wrath,
he says, but he has appointed us to salvation. To obtain salvation by our Lord
Jesus Christ. Scripture says, salvations of
the Lord. I brought that as the radio message,
I think, this Sunday. It is of His appointing, it is
His work. God has appointed for you who
believe, so if you believe it's evident, that God has appointed
for you to obtain salvation. Can you imagine that? You know, going through this
has really helped me, even looking at this thing of death, even
with a more clear light. I'm not looking at dying. I'm looking at living. I'm looking
at living. We are about to live. We are
about to really know what life is without sin. We're about to
know it. Salvation is something we obtain
through another, the Lord Jesus Christ. We've obtained it through
Him, not by merit, not by ours, by His, yes. Look in verse 10. Who died for
us? That's why I won't experience
death and you won't experience death. The Lord Jesus Christ
already experienced death on our behalf. Who died for us? The very foundation
of our hope is the atonement that we have through the death
of the Lord Jesus Christ, through His blood and righteousness.
If Christ died for us, this ought to be enough to excite us to
watchfulness and expectation of His return. I can't express what God has
done for us. It's just beyond expression. But what we have
here is a particular person, the Son of God, died for a particular
people. A bunch of sinners chosen of
God before the world began. Election does not lead to licentiousness. I tell you what, election leads
to thankfulness. Thank you, Lord, for choosing
me. It leads to thankfulness and godliness. The Scripture
says the grace of God teaches us to deny ungodliness. And He says here that whether
we wake or sleep, we may die before He comes, or we may be
alive on this earth when He comes. Either way, does it matter? Does
it matter? It really doesn't matter. You're
going to change anyway. If you die, you're going to change.
And if you're alive when He comes, you're going to go through a
change. You're going to go through a change. Either way, we shall live together
with Him. The end result of Christ dying
for us is that we shall live together with Him as one harmonious
family. There won't be any disputes.
There won't be any problems. All problems are gone. Gone. Verse 11, he says, Wherefore,
seeing this is so... Did you hear what was said tonight? Did you hear what the Spirit
of God said in this chapter? Wherefore, comfort yourselves
together. Verse 11. Comfort yourselves
together and edify one another." Build one another up, even as
also you do. I know you do it. He said, do
it even more. Build each other up even more. Comfort one another concerning
the resurrection. Comfort one another concerning
His second coming. Comfort one another of being
together with the Lord. Isn't it good news to know that
we have been appointed to obtain salvation in Jesus Christ, that
it's sure we cannot lose it? I can't give you better news.
If you're looking for better news than that, well, there's not any. There's
not any. And these are the words that
we are to comfort one another with, right here. This is it.
If you can't find any comfort in this, Seriously, you got problems. Serious problems.