SOMEDAY, THE BLESSED HOPE
Titus 2:1-15 (KJV)
But speak thou the things which become sound doctrine:
That the aged men be sober, grave, temperate, sound in faith, in charity, in patience.
The aged women likewise, that they be in behaviour as becometh holiness, not false accusers, not given to much wine, teachers of good things;
That they may teach the young women to be sober, to love their husbands, to love their children,
To be discreet, chaste, keepers at home, good, obedient to their own husbands, that the word of God be not blasphemed.
Young men likewise exhort to be sober minded.
In all things shewing thyself a pattern of good works: in doctrine shewing uncorruptness, gravity, sincerity,
Sound speech, that cannot be condemned; that he that is of the contrary part may be ashamed, having no evil thing to say of you.
Exhort servants to be obedient unto their own masters, and to please them well in all things; not answering again;
Not purloining, but shewing all good fidelity; that they may adorn the doctrine of God our Saviour in all things.
For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,
Teaching us that, denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;
Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee.
I became a believer in the late 1970’s.
It was a time when Christians spoke a great deal about prophetical subjects.
Hal Lindsey had written books on the subject like
· The Late Great Planet Earth and
· There’s a New World Coming
There was a series of movies that got passed around about the Tribulation such as:
· A Thief In the Night
· A Distant Thunder and
· The Image of the Beast
I saw them as a young Christian and, to say the least, was terrified at the prospect of those I know not being saved and going through the Tribulation Period.
Jack Van Impe, was in his heyday among Independent Baptist Preachers at the time.[1]
Tracy Dartt had written, and we were all singing, “The Last Sunday”
(I would like for us to play this right now. – it’s not the best recording of it, but it will get the point across.)
https://youtu.be/AQSoAcirnl8
There was a sense of urgency among Christians.
· We believed Jesus could come again at any moment.
· We spoke about it
· We talked to unsaved people about it
We used:
· Songs
· Books and
· Visuals (like the lapel pin)
to strike up those conversations to tell others about Jesus and to encourage them to be saved.
We believed it to be a blessed hope, we prayed for it and, though I do not believe a lot of us were any more spiritual than most of us are today, it the subject of Jesus’ coming again was on our minds.
I am going to begin, the Lord willing, next Sunday night preaching through the book of Titus.
In this message I simply want to point out three simple lessons we learn from this text.
First of all, this is
I. A THEOLOGICAL HOPE
Titus 2:13-14 (KJV)
Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
It would be very difficult to misunderstand the meaning of these two verses wouldn’t it?
The One we are looking to appear is Jesus Christ.
· He is the One who gave Himself for us
· He is the One who redeemed us from all iniquity
· He is our Saviour Jesus Christ
Did you notice that, that before the passage said any of that it calls Him, “the great God.”
That is our Jesus – He is “the great God.”
· He is not a lesser god as the Jehovah’s Witnesses claim Him to be.
· He is not the brother of Lucifer as the Mormons claim Him to be.
· He is not the last great prophet before Mohammed as the Muslims claim Him to be.
When we look for that blessed hope, the appearing of our Saviour Jesus Christ, we are looking for the appearing of “the great God.”
· This is not to suggest that we think less of God the Father
· This is not to say that we yield less to God the Holy Spirit
But it is to remind us that
· The God who became man
· The God who became obedient unto death on the cross
· The God who rose again and “ever liveth to make intercession for us”
· The Saviour of our souls and redeemer of our sins
· The One for which we long
is the great God.
When I look for the blessed hope I look for the one in whom “dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily.”[4]
Consider secondly that it is
II. A BLESSED HOPE
Titus 2:13 (KJV)
Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
As I understand the Word of God, the Bible teaches that the very next prophesy on God’s timeline:
· The Lord Jesus Christ will come to the clouds,
· The trumpet of God will sound and
· All Christians, dead and living, will be called to meet the Lord in the air.[5]
It is a pre-tribulational rapture.
All Christians, those who are asleep in the Lord right now and those who are alive and remain at the coming of Jesus Christ will go together to meet the Lord.
Before the seven year Tribulation described in the book of Daniel and the Book of the Revelation of Jesus Christ
I would further claim that this understanding of the rapture, and only this one could be considered “that blessed hope.”
A. How could the thought that Jesus will never come again and everything will just continue as it is be a blessed hope?
Everything we observe in history tells us that this world swings like on a pendulum.
· Things get good then
· Things get bad and sometimes
· Things get worse before eventually
· Things get good again
Sometimes this pendulum can swing so slowly that nobody can remember when it was ever different than it is right now.
Sometimes I speak to people whose real hope is that, if things are bad right now, maybe they will get better before too long.
There is no blessing, no happiness, no real hope in that hope.
B. How could the thought that Jesus will come again but only after the seven-year Tribulation and you will be raptured if you survive it be a blessed hope?
The people who believe and preach this sort of doctrine are doomsdayers.
· They talk about building hidden fortresses in the mountains
· Stocking food supplies, guns and ammunition to protect ourselves and
· Preach that only those strong enough in their faith to endure to the end will be saved
I ask you, how can anyone honestly hope for that?
How could it ever be considered a blessed hope?
There is only one doctrine of future things that could ever be considered a blessed hope…
It is that Jesus Christ will call all of the Christians to heaven BEFORE the troubles of Daniel and Revelation try the earth.
I want to hurry to my final point and show you that this blessed hope is
III. A SOUND HOPE
Titus 2:1 (KJV)
But speak thou the things which become sound doctrine:
Notice how Titus chapter two begins,
But speak thou the things which become sound doctrine:
Included in those things“which become sound doctrine”is,“…that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.”
I said at the beginning of this message that, when I became a Christian, waaaaaayback in the 1970’s,
· We believed the pre-tribulational rapture of Christians to be a blessed hope
· We preached about it
· We prayed for it and
· The subject of Jesus’ coming again was constantly on our minds.
But even back then there were some who disagreed with the idea that Jesus could come again soon.
I remember listening to KPDQ radio in Portland one day.
The host was giving people opportunity to call in and share their frustrations about their pastor.
One lady called in and said, “My pastor constantly preaches that Jesus is coming again. Why does he have to be so negative?”
The Pentecostalswere pushing a prophetical concept they called, “The Mid-Trib Rapture” claiming that Christians have to go through the first three and a half years of the Tribulation.
Walter Martin,then known as “The Bible Answer Man” taught a Post Tribulation position, that Christians had to go through the whole Tribulation and be raptured at the end of it (if they survived).
Everything seems to swing on a pendulum so that, among Independent Baptists there seems to be two commonly held positions today:
A. The pre-wrath rapture(which provides no blessed hope)
The pre-wrath rapture idea claims that the rapture of the Christians to heaven happens:
· Not before the Tribulation, like I believe and teach and
· Not after the Tribulation like Walter Martin, and other post tribulationalists believe and teach but
· In the middle of the Tribulation. At the 3 ½ year mark, like the Pentecostals of the 1970’s believed and taught
It's a compromise position.
· Living Christians have to go through some of the Tribulation, so they had better get prepared for it but
· They won’t have to go through the worst of the Tribulation, so they can be hopeful about that I guess
Those who hold to this position tend to be younger preachers[6]who, for whatever reason, believe themselves to be smarter than the preachers who trained them.
B. The pre-tribulation rapture(which is the blessed hope)[7]
But it seems like most who hold this position are not passionate about it.
We claim to believe it, but we would not want to fight about it, and we sure don’t live like it.
It’s like we believe it doctrinally, but really don’t believe it is going to happen – at least not in our lifetime.
· We need to get back our passion.
· We need to start praying once again for Jesus to come.
· We need to once again live believing that today, this very day, may be the day when we stand in the presence of “the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.”
The Bible says, 1 John 3:1-3 (KJV)
Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not.
Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is.
And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.
[1]He was once nominated to be the President of the Baptist Bible Fellowship International. It is my understanding that he turned down the nomination, accusing the BBFI of being too separatist.
[2]Or it could have been Jerry Falwell. I can’t remember for sure.
[3]We all wore lapel pins in those days.
[4]Colossians 2:9 (KJV)
For in him dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily.
[5]1 Thessalonians 4:13-18 (KJV)
But I would not have you to be ignorant, brethren, concerning them which are asleep, that ye sorrow not, even as others which have no hope.
For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him.
For this we say unto you by the word of the Lord, that we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep.
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.
Wherefore comfort one another with these words.
[6]In fairness I do admit that the preachers who first promoted it among the IBF the were older and well respected before they embraced this doctrine.
[7]I recently sat on an ordination council where the candidate’s position on the rapture would have been totally ignored except that in the last few moments the moderator opened the floor to “bullet round” questions. Supposedly quick questions with quicker answers and I was at least able to ask what his position was.
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