I love you all so much, and I'm
so glad to see you. I'm looking forward to our weekend
together. I pray the Lord will bless us,
meet with us. Turn with me to 1 Timothy chapter
6. I have pretty much the same message
Brother David just preached. 1 Timothy 6, let's begin reading in verse
13. I give thee charge in the sight
of God who quickeneth all things, and before Christ Jesus, who
before Pontius Pilate witnessed a good confession, that thou
keep this commandment without spot, unrebukable, until the
appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ, which in His times He shall show
who is the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings and Lord of
lords, who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no
man can approach unto, whom no man hath seen nor can see. to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen. I love declarations like
that about the Lord Jesus Christ. That's who this is about. That's
who that's talking about. The Lord Jesus Christ. The end
of verse 14, he said, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ. There is a man in glory right
now. I like that a lot. There is a
man in glory right now, the God-man. He is in glory right now. And in His times, in His perfect
time, He will appear again to this earth. This earth, we always think of us going to
be with Him where He is. We think of our time, you know,
it's always there. Well, He's coming back here where
we are. At least in the clouds, He's
coming back here again. Our Lord appeared before this
earth ever was as the Lamb slain before the foundation of the
world. He appeared, the Lamb slain before the foundation of
this world. And then he appeared. As the
creator and the owner of all things, when he laid the foundations
of this world. All things were made by him,
without him was not anything made that was made. Throughout history and time,
He appeared to men and women, His creatures in the world. He appeared to Adam and Eve.
That was Jesus Christ that they walked in the cool of the garden
with. He appeared to Abraham and Sarah. That was Jesus Christ that Sarah
laughed at. He appeared to Jacob. That was Jesus Christ Jacob was
wrestling with. He appeared to Moses. That was
Jesus Christ that Moses spoke with face to face as a man speaketh
with his friend. That's amazing, isn't it? He appeared to Manoah and his
wife. God didn't kill him. He appeared to Shadrach, Meshach,
and Abednego. He appeared to Nebuchadnezzar.
Nebuchadnezzar said, I see four men walking in that furnace.
One of them looks just like the Son of God. How did he know that? How did
he know he looked like the Son of God? If you ever see Christ,
you will know Him. If you ever see Christ, you will
know Him. He appeared to Elijah. He appeared
to Mary. He appeared to Joseph. He appeared
to the wise men at His birth. He appeared to Simeon, eight
days old. Eight days old. For 33 and a half years, He appeared
to all the land of Judah round about. He appeared to Mary Magdalene
after His resurrection. Well, she was lucky, wasn't she? He appeared to all the disciples.
At one point, He appeared to above 500 brethren at one time. He definitely appeared to Saul
of Tarsus, didn't He? He's going to appear again. You know, we think about everybody
I just said, and it's like, well, that was that, that was the past,
that was then, that was a magical moment, you know. He is going
to appear to us again. Every eye shall see Him. You're going to see Jesus Christ
from this earth. That is exciting to me. Every eye is going to see Him. Turn over to Acts chapter 1. Acts chapter 1. Our Lord is standing
on the Mount of Olives in Bethany with His disciples. And he said
some final words to them. Verse nine, Acts chapter one,
verse nine says, And when he had spoken these things, while
they beheld, he was taken up and a cloud received him out
of their sight. And while they looked steadfastly
toward heaven as He went up, behold, two men stood by them
in white apparel, which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why
stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken
up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as you
have seen Him go into heaven." As you have seen Him ascend up
in power. You know, here they were, they
were just awestruck. As you have seen Him ascend up
in authority, in victory. Can you imagine that sight? As you have seen him ascend up
to the throne in glory, that's how he is going to come again
from the throne in glory. This same man is coming back
in power and authority and victory. There is a man seated on a throne
in heaven right now, the God-man, and he is going to appear to
us again And we need to be warned of His appearing. It's exciting for some, but every
soul on this earth needs to be warned of His appearing. He really
is coming back. He really is coming back. We
need to be ready for His appearing. It can happen at any moment.
It can happen at any moment. Turn over to 2 Thessalonians
1. 2 Thessalonians 1 verse 6, it says,
seeing it is a righteous thing with God to recompense tribulation
to them that trouble you. And to you who are troubled,
rest with us when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from heaven
with his mighty angels in flaming fire taking vengeance on them
that know not God and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus
Christ, who shall be punished with everlasting destruction
from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power
when He shall come to be glorified in His saints and to be admired
in all them that believe." Because our testimony among you was believed
in that day. He is going to appear to us again,
and this time it will not be in humility and meekness. That's what people need to know. This time it will not be in humility
and meekness. I'm not on Facebook, but Hannah
is. I'll throw her under the bus.
But I do snoop on her page. And I read a post today that
really broke my heart for this particular person. And it reminded
me that most every man and woman thinks that gentle Jesus, meek
and mild, loves everybody and wants everybody to be saved.
And He's not willing that any should perish. And they think
that's how He's coming back. They think He's just going to
come back, you know, just so. That's not how He's coming back.
That's not how he's coming back this time. He's not coming in
humility and meekness. It will be in power and glory. Look right here at 1 Thessalonians
4 verse 16. For the Lord himself shall descend
from heaven with a shout. with the voice of the archangel
and with the trump of God, and the dead in Christ shall rise
first, then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up
together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air,
and so shall we ever be with the Lord." He is about to appear
to us again, and for every soul that is found in Him, it's going
to be an appearing unto glory. It is going to be glory. It's
going to be glory. I was just sitting here, there,
and here, you know, just thinking about how much I love everybody.
I got here. I moved here in 2002, 22 years ago. And all of us had
less gray hair. And Mindy was younger than I
am now when I moved here. And the thing I was thinking
is, everybody just hang in there. We're almost done. But then I
changed my mind and I thought, well, hang in there. It's about
to start. It's going to be glorious. It's going to be at His appearing.
Before all that fire falls and all that destruction falls, He's
going to say, angels, go get them. Then it's going to be... It's
going to be glory. Utter glory. But to every soul that's not
found in Him, to every soul that's found in Him, that appearing
is going to be under glory. But to every soul that's not
found in Him, to every soul that's not found under the covering
of the blood, under the safe covering and atonement of the
blood, It's going to be an appearing unto destruction and condemnation. It's going to be one of the two. Look at 2 Timothy 4. 2 Timothy 4 verse 1 says, I charge
thee therefore before God and the Lord Jesus Christ who shall
judge the living and the dead, the quick and the dead, at his
appearing and his kingdom. There is going to be a right
hand and a left hand, the living and the dead. And Jesus Christ
is going to be the judge. We must all stand before the
judgment seat of Jesus Christ. And the judgment is not going
to go like people naturally think it's going to go. It's not going
to go that way. Our Lord did not come to call
the righteous. He did not come to call the self-righteous,
the false religious. The goody two shoes are not going to end up on his
right hand. They're not. They're not going to end up on
his right hand. Every soul on his right hand will be a wretched,
miserable, unworthy sinner. Head hung low. If our head is
held high, it's only because we're looking at him. He came to save sinners. He came
to save sinners. And men and women are going to
find that out the moment He appears. Turn over to Revelation 1. Revelation 1 verse 1 says this
is the revelation of Jesus Christ. This is the revelation of Jesus
Christ. Verse 7, Behold, he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall
see him, and they also which pierced him. Who pierced him?
Religion pierced him. You know that? The Jews' religion. The Romans just carried out Jews
demanded for them to do. He cometh with clouds, every
eye shall see him, and they also, which pierced him, and all kindreds
of the earth shall wail because of him. Even so, amen. Now, I want us to understand
something that's very important. Our Lord said in John 17, this
is life eternal. This is eternal life. that they
might know Thee, the only true God and Jesus Christ whom Thou
hast sent." Eternal life is in knowing the true God, Jesus Christ. Knowing Him. Knowing who He is. Knowing what He is in reality,
in truth. And in Matthew 11, our Lord said,
the only way that we can know Him is if He reveals Himself
to us. That's the only way. It's in His power to reveal Himself
to us. It's in His power to reveal Himself
to whoever He's pleased to reveal Himself to. That ought to make
us to be beggars. that really should make us from
here on out to be beggars. Please reveal yourself to me.
When you find men and women who speak of Him in a flippant way, with no reverence, no fear, you
have found a man or a woman who does not know Him. When you find
a man or a woman who speaks of Him as being needy, and frustrated. Or discouraged. Or asking for
someone's cooperation or permission when you find a man or a woman
who speaks of the Lord Jesus Christ in that way, you found
a man or a woman who does not know him. And to not know Jesus Christ
is to not know eternal life. So our prayer is that the Spirit
of God will take the Word of God, and through this Word, He
will reveal Christ to us. The Christ who truly is coming
back. I pray that we might know who
Jesus Christ is. Go back to 1 Timothy 6. 1 Timothy 6, verse 13. It says,
I give thee charge in the sight of God, who quickeneth all things,
and before Christ Jesus, who before Pontius Pilate witnessed
a good confession, that thou keep this commandment without
spot, unrebukable, until the appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ,
which in His times He shall show who is the blessed and only potentate,
the King of kings and Lord of lords, who only hath immortality,
dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto, whom no
man hath seen nor can see, to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen. Who is Jesus Christ? He is the blessed and only potentate. Potentate means power, authority,
sovereign. Jesus Christ is the blessed. He is the anointed. He is the
acknowledged only power that there is. He is the only authority
that there is. He is the only sovereign that
there is. And what that means is when men
and women separate God and Jesus Christ in their minds, like people
do, as though God stayed in heaven and he sent somebody else down
here to do a work. When men and women separate God
and Jesus Christ, that evidences the fact that that man or that
woman does not know God and does not know Jesus Christ. You cannot know one without the
other. You cannot have one without the
other. They cannot be separated. This is life eternal that we
might know Jesus Christ, and to know Jesus Christ is to know
God Almighty. God did not just send Jesus Christ
to this earth. God, the Almighty, came down. Emmanuel, God, the potentate,
the only blessed sovereign that there is, came down. He veiled
Himself in the likeness of human flesh. He veiled His glory. He veiled His glory. You know,
Scripture says, No man hath seen Him. Even those that saw Him
while He was here, they saw Him in veiled glory. Oh, just wait
until you see Him now. He veiled His glory to the point
that when men and women saw Him, they didn't see anything in Him
that they should desire Him. Why did He do that? Why did He
do that? It's because He came here to
be the substitute for me. And there's nothing in me that
men and women should desire me. You think you do, but if you
really knew me, you wouldn't. The amazing mystery of the Gospel
is God Almighty came in a way that allowed men to despise Him. He allowed it. He allowed men
to despise Him and reject Him. That's amazing. He humbled Himself
down so that He could be a man of sorrows, our sorrows, acquainted
with our grief. in order to save His people from
their sin. He allowed Himself to be handled
by men. He allowed Himself to be manhandled. He allowed Himself to be judged
before men. He allowed Himself to be condemned
before men. He allowed Himself to be nailed
to a cross, pierced by men. laid in a grave
by men. He willingly took the weakness
of His people. The weakness of His people. When
He bore our infirmities, He bore our frailties. For us, He died
in our weakness. For us, so we don't have to. You're looking at a weak man
and I'm looking at some weak people. And for us, He died in our weakness. But He was raised in power. He was raised in power. And that's where He abides right
now. In His power. Where is He right now? He's in
His power. And in his time, he shall show
to every man and woman on this earth. Who is the blessed and
only potentate, the only sovereign that there is the sovereign in
creation, the sovereign in salvation. As our brother just said, the
sovereign in everything, every eternal thing, every physical
thing. Verse 15 says he is the king
of kings. He's not waiting for his subjects
to give him permission to do anything. He's the sovereign
seated on the throne and he does what he wants to do with whoever
he wants to do it. They said, where's your God,
David? He said, God's in the heavens doing whatever he wants
to do. That's what we need to realize,
Jesus Christ does whatever he wants to do. You know, if people
knew that, they would have a right mind. If they knew that, they
would sit down and have a right mind. Because they think that He's
trying to do everything under the sun. He's never tried to
do anything. After the Lord appeared to Nebuchadnezzar,
this is what little King Nebuchadnezzar said, He said, the Lord is God
on the throne. He's the king. And He does what
He wants with the armies of heaven and the inhabitants of the earth.
And nobody can stop Him and nobody can question Him. Jesus Christ, the only sovereign
King of kings and Lord of lords that there is. Potentate means
He's the sovereign authority. King means He is the sovereign
authority. Lord means He is the sovereign
authority. You can't make Him Lord. He is
Lord. Who is Jesus Christ? Who are
we dealing with here? The sovereign authority. While this world of false religion
lies to men and women, telling them that the authority is in
their hands, in His times, He shall show who
is the blessed and only potentate, the King of kings and Lord of
lords, who only hath immortality. All the fullness of the Godhead
dwells in Jesus Christ bodily. Christ is the express image of
the Godhead. There are three, but these three
are one. In Christ is God. In Him we have
God. And therefore, Jesus Christ is
the only one who has immortality. If we end up with immortality,
it's only going to be because we're in Him. We're with Him. He said, because I live, you
live. That's the reason why. Without Him, there's no life.
There's no immortality. Verse 16 says, Who only hath
immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach
unto whom no man hath seen nor can see." God is light. The holy just God is light. His
holy glory is light. And the holiness, the glory is
so great, it's so bright. This is what one man said, and
I honestly believe this to be so. I don't know who said it. I put one man said. If Jesus Christ appeared to us
at high noon, if when he comes back it's high noon, we would never see the rays of
the sun. I believe that the sun would
go dark. It'd be invisible. You couldn't
see it compared to his glory. His holiness, His righteousness,
His justice. It's an exposing light. It exposes everything. It exposes
everything that no man or woman can approach unto. Not in our
sin, not in our flesh. That light is a consuming fire.
To men and women in their sin. When Jesus Christ appeared, and
just so you know, I'm basically done. I always like to tell people
that because everybody, ok, we're done, I'm dialing in. When Jesus Christ appeared on
Mount Sinai, the whole place exploded in fire. And Jesus Christ, who said, Moses
wrote of me, you know, Moses kept talking about God, the Lord,
Jehovah. The Lord said Moses was talking
about me, Moses wrote of me, God said, Moses, you tell the people that
they had better not come near to this mountain. They better
not come near me or they will die in their sins. My holiness
will consume them. They cannot come to me in their
sin. In another place, he said, no man can even look on me and
live. If a sinful man just looks at
him, he will die in his sin. If a sinful man goes to meet
God, the moment that sinful man's eye sees Him. But by the appearing of the Lord
Jesus Christ, when He appeared in the Holy of Holies, in Heaven
itself, He appeared in the holiest of all. bearing
His own blood to make an atonement for the sin of His people. When
He appeared, right there, with that sin being atoned for, dealt
with, satisfied, paid for, put away, with it all being gone
and settled and finished. Do you know what 2 Corinthians
4 says? It says we can now look right
into the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face
of Jesus Christ. That's amazing. That is amazing. He's not just the Potentate and
King and Lord, He is the Blessed Potentate and King and Lord.
He is the Author and the Finisher, the Sovereign of our salvation,
and our faith. He is our maker, our defender,
our redeemer, our friend. And the end of verse 16 says,
to whom be honor and power everlasting. Amen. I pray God will reveal
that to us, to me. I want God to reveal that to
me. I pray God will reveal Christ to us. May the Spirit of God
truly reveal Jesus Christ to us. May we know Him when He returns. I want to know Him when He returns.
I want you to know Him when He returns. But more importantly
than that, I want Him to know us. I want Him to call us by name.
I know you, I love you. That's life eternal. Amen.