I am teaching a class on prophecy on Sunday mornings at 10:15 am at JBC. It is being Live Streamed as well or you can watch it anytime on You Tube after the class is taught. One of the topics that we will be talking about in the days ahead is the ”Rapture” when followers of Jesus rise into the air to meet Jesus.

1 Corinthians 15:51-52 Behold, I tell you a mystery; we will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet; for the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we will be changed.

1 Thessalonians 4:14-17 For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus. For this we say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord, will not precede those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel and with the trumpet of God, and the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the Lord.

There are several things to note in these passages; (1) the spirits of those who have already died will be with Jesus when He comes and they will get their glorified bodies just a split second before those who are alive and on the earth will. (2) We will all meet together in one big crowd in the sky at the level that the clouds usually form.(3) There will angels with Jesus along with the spirits of those who have previously died. ( 4) When Jesus descends from heaven He will give out a big shout, which I believe will be, ”COME UP HERE” and those alive will all hear it. (5) An angel will blow a trumpet which seems to be the signal for everyone to get their new bodies.

One of the points that there is discussion about is the timing of this event, when does it happen in regards to the other events that are going to be happening. The main one being the seven-year Tribulation period. I strongly believe that the rapture happens before the Tribulation starts, this is called the pre-tribulational view. Others think it will be in the middle of the Tribulation or a little after the middle, this view is called the Mid-Tribulational view or Pre-wrath view. And then some think it will be at the end of the Tribulation which is called the Post-Tribulational view. There is also the ”partial rapture” view that believes only mature delivers leave with Jesus before the Tribulation and the rest go through the Tribulation to further develop their character. And then there is the ”Preterist” view that teaches that the Tribulation already happened way back in 90 AD.

There are a dozen reasons I believe in the Pre-Trib view, but I will give you just one today.

2 Thessalonians 1:4-10 therefore, we ourselves speak proudly of you among the churches of God for your perseverance and faith in the midst of all your persecutions and afflictions which you endure. This is a plain indication of God’s righteous judgment so that you will be considered worthy of the kingdom of God, for which indeed you are suffering. For after all it is only just for God to repay with affliction those who afflict you, and to give relief to you who are afflicted and to us as well when the Lord Jesus will be revealed from heaven with His mighty angels in flaming fire, dealing out retribution to those who do not know God and to those who do not obey the gospel of our Lord Jesus. These will pay the penalty of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of His power, when He comes to be glorified in His saints on that day, and to be marveled at among all who have believed.

Again some observations; (1) God gives relief to all believers alive when Jesus is revealed from heaven with His angels. That relief would come because we are taken out of the world. (2) Those who do not know God and have not believed the gospel get left behind, separated away from the presence of the Lord to experience the awfulness of the Tribulation and ultimately hell forever. (3)Those who Paul wrote to at the church in Thessalonica were suffering at the time he writes the letter so he certainly was not suggesting that the rescue and relief he was promising was from the Tribulation. (4) Paul is writing this passage to give the saints at Thessalonica hope suggesting that the rapture could be at any moment, the imminent return of Jesus has been a foundational teaching of the church since Paul wrote this letter.

And the final observation for us. Times will get bad and we will experience trials, but we will get rescued and experience relief when we get raptured and then it will get awful here on this planet. Some are fearful of the increasing lawlessness and chaos that seems to be increasing daily, but that is what we get rescued from, so take heart.

Daniel 3:1-6. Nebuchadnezzar the king made an image of gold, the height of which was sixty cubits and its width six cubits; he set it up on the plain of Dura in the province of Babylon. Then Nebuchadnezzar the king sent word to assemble the satraps, the prefects and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates and all the rulers of the provinces to come to the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up. Then the satraps, the prefects and the governors, the counselors, the treasurers, the judges, the magistrates and all the rulers of the provinces were assembled for the dedication of the image that Nebuchadnezzar the king had set up; and they stood before the image that Nebuchadnezzar had set up. Then the herald loudly proclaimed: “To you the command is given, O peoples, nations and men of every language, that at the moment you hear the sound of the horn, flute, lyre, trigon, psaltery, bagpipe and all kinds of music, you are to fall down and worship the golden image that Nebuchadnezzar the king has set up. But whoever does not fall down and worship shall immediately be cast into the midst of a furnace of blazing fire.”

Nebuchadnezzar had it all. He was the ruler of the most powerful kingdom, probably in the entire history of the world. He was rich beyond measure. He had hundreds, if not thousands of wives and concubines. So why did he do this statue thing, ordering everyone to bow down to him? What was the motivation for doing such a thing? There appears to be in people this desire to be a god.

In the book entitled ”Unbroken” and the movie that followed the story is told of Louis Zamperini, a World War II Bombardier who was shot down, survived 47 days in a rubber raft and then became a prisoner of war in Japan. Louie had a supervisor in the camp, he was imprisoned in obsessed with getting Louie to cower before him. The bulk of the book and the movie are about this confrontation of wills, and as the title suggests, Louie was unbroken though he was tortured terribly for several years. So, the same question comes to mind, why would someone inflict such horrible cruelty simply to dominate another human being.

It goes back to the beginning in the Garden of Eden when the devil tempted Adam and Eve. He said to them ”if you eat this fruit you will be like God, ” so they ate it, and people have been trying to be like a god ever since by bossing other people around and telling them what to do.

In a couple of weeks we will celebrate Thanksgiving, a holiday based on the Pilgrims celebration of thanks in 1621. They came to America on the Mayflower to escape the tyranny of England where rulers were telling them how they were to worship. The United States of America is a country that had it’s beginning as a place of freedom. Our National Anthem says, ”the home of the free and the land of the brave.”

Revelation 13:16-17 And he causes all, the small and the great, and the rich and the poor, and the free men and the slaves, to be given a mark on their right hand or on their forehead, and he provides that no one will be able to buy or to sell, except the one who has the mark, either the name of the beast or the number of his name.

A question; why does this man in Revelation who has become the President of the entire world make a law requiring that everybody receive this mark on their hand or forehead?

I think the answer is, to show that he can. I am the most powerful man on the earth and to prove it I will boss everyone around.

Our government is controlling people by creating fear in them, by threatening them with consequences, by shaming them, and by the power of mass migration, (everybody is doing it so it must be right). The media has communicated huge amounts of skewed, biased, and false information in order to create this mass hysteria, this fear of catching COVID and dying. Face book, Twitter, Google, and YouTube have censored and banned almost all contrary information.

Thousands of doctors and scientists have published documents and signed documents that say the consequences of lockdowns are worse than catching COVID, that we are just postponing the inevitable, and that masks do no good.

A question; So why are all these rules being made and enforced? The same answer, to prove that they are ”all-powerful” and can. It is the spirit of the antichrist fueled by the devil who is working through people to create a one-world government, a one-world economy, and a one-world religion.

I put my ballot in the ballot box by the Fire Station in Jefferson today, I voted. It is interesting talking to some people about that experience of voting. They often express an attitude of futility because they are only one person among millions. One fellow I talked to said that he and his wife didn’t vote, and the reason was because he couldn’t talk her into voting for Trump and she couldn’t talk him into voting for Biden so they decided rather than just cancelling each other out they would just not vote.

A mindset that I have tried hard to develop in myself is to do everything that I do for the Lord. To think about what His will would be according to the Bible and then make choices that I believe will please Him. I can make choices based on what I think is best for my kids or me or others, but I have the most confidence figuring out the right choice using God as the reason for all that I do.

Colossians 3:23-24 Whatever you do, do your work heartily, as for the Lord rather than for men, knowing that from the Lord you will receive the reward of the inheritance. It is the Lord Christ whom you serve.

One of the blessings of making choices and acting on the basis of what I believe will please the Lord is that I know that what I do does not get lost in the crowd. Though there are many people and there has been many people God is more than capable of keeping close track of me and what I do. He promises that everything I do matters to Him and someday when I stand before Him He will reward me.

1 Corinthians 15:58 Therefore, my beloved brethren, be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that your toil is not in vain in the Lord.

The bad person that I am is called my “flesh” in the Bible.

Galatians 5:19–21 Now the deeds of the flesh are evident, which are: immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmities, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and things like these,

My goal is to conquor this wicked tendency in me, and to live a life that pleases God and blesses others.

1 Corinthians 9:27 but I discipline my body and make it my slave,

2 Timothy 2:22 Now flee from youthful lusts and pursue righteousness, faith, love and peace, with those who call on the Lord from a pure heart.

A very powerful tool that I have in my pursuit of righteousness is goal setting. I write goals about what I don’t want to do and I write goals of things I do want to do. I write goals of bad habits I want to quit and I write goals of good habits I want to start.

The problem is that I forget what my goals are, so it does no good to write them down. I forget what I aspired to and keep doing what I have always done.

But I have solved that problem, I read my goals every day, and I don’t forget, in fact by reading them every day they get stronger and stronger in my mind and heart, and I can’t hardly not do them.

Writing out my goals every year and reading them every day isn’t really that hard, and it doesn’t really take that much time, but the rewards are life-changing. I can’t imagine at this point in my life not doing this basic discipline. And I can’t for the life of me figure out why so few people practice this basic key to success in life.

I write yearly goals for my life, and I write one for every year old that I am, so this year I have 72 goals. I start reading my goals every day on my birthday, so I just finished with my second reading of my new goals. As I read each one I think about it for a minute in regards to how I am going to accomplish it. Some of them are ongoing, so I never really accomplish them until the end of the year. An example is reading my Bible every day, or praying with Patty 3 times a week, or reading 80 pages a week in a good book. Some are fun and won’t take much work to accomplish other than making the time for them, like fishing in the Colombia for Salmon 3 times. Several are BHAG’s, Big Hairy Audacious Goals, and they will take a huge amount of planning, preparation, and work.

One of my BHAG’s is to start a satellite church. A satellite church uses a video presentation for the preaching and possibly for worship as well. This saves from having to find someone to be the Pastor and worship leader. I just need to find someone to do the administration and to lead the services. We have video recorded a bunch of my sermons so I have a good source of sermons to use for this new church. I need to find a place to start it, recruit some core people, advertise a bunch, and then find the time. Once I successfully start one I should be able to do a bunch more. The goal would include finding a Pastor and staff after the church grows to the point that offering income would support them.

Another BHAG of another sort is climbing Mt Adams. I have attempted and failed to summit the last five times I have tried to climb it, so I am determined to make it this year. I plan to camp on the Mountain for two nights and take three days to climb it and make the descent. I will do a bunch of running this year to get in shape for the climb. I am pretty sure I can do it.

Goals add a great deal of focus to my life. I know what my goals are, and I don’t fool around with anything else. I can’t imagine trying to live my lifec successfully without the power of goals.

I am getting older physically every day. From birth to about 30 I got progressively stronger, more coordinated, and smarter. From 30 to about 60 I pretty much held my own in regards to what I could do and how I felt. From 60 to 72 it has been a fairly steady decline in what I am able to do and how I feel. I imagine the next 15 years will be pretty much the same as the last 12 years. I became a member of God’s family when I was 13 and I began to grow on the inside in the way of character and I think I have had pretty steady growth since then. There were a couple of time blocks that I plateaued, a couple when I back slid a little, and then some periods in my life that I grew at a higher than normal pace, but for the most part it has been a steady rate of growth similar to what I experienced physically in my first 20 years.

The goal that I have is that before I die or before Jesus returns, whichever comes first, that I will be perfect. The word perfect in the Bible doesn’t mean sinless; it means grown-up in character, fully mature. It is God’s will for each of us who claim to know Him and love Him.

Philippians was one of the last books that the Apostle Paul wrote, probably when he was about 64 years old, and Nero martyred him when he was about 65 years of age. In the letter, Paul says that he was not yet perfect; he is pressing on toward being perfect. Paul, by this time, has written most of his letters that are part of the Bible, he started many churches and has lived a great life for God, but he felt he still had some more growing to do.

Philippians 3:12-14 Not that I have already obtained it or have already become perfect, but I press on so that I may lay hold of that for which also I was laid hold of by Christ Jesus. Brethren, I do not regard myself as having laid hold of it yet; but one thing I do: forgetting what lies behind and reaching forward to what lies ahead, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

So, I can say with confidence that ”I have not already obtained it or have already become perfect, ” in fact I would say that I have a long way to go, but I would say along with Paul, ”I press on toward the goal of being perfect, of being what God planned for me when I was born again.”

”I press on, ” twice Paul says that in this passage. It means to put out extreme effort, and that is what I want to do, that is what I intend to do.

I am teaching a class on prophecy Sunday mornings at 10:15 am, and it is being “live-streamed” and you can watch it on YouTube live or any time after that. I enjoy teaching and even more I enjoy the study that I need to do in order to do a good job teaching. Prophecy, what God has planned for the future is a fascinating subject. A third of the Bible is prophecy so evidently it is an important topic to God. He has planned out the future and as God is perfectly able to carry out His plans. There are lots of opinions on the information recorded in the Bible based on varying hermeneutical methods and presuppositions, but there is only one true and accurate interpretation and I want to be able to discover that and teach it clearly and understandably in my class so that each person is motivated to live their life with a sense of urgency. A major reason to study this topic is that recognizing that the events that are happening rapidly around us daily are not just out of control craziness by people but the very plans of God. The study of hermeneutics gives a person a strong sense of security knowing that it has all been planned out by God in advance and I am in His family and He will take care of me and take me to heaven.

Isaiah 46:9-11 Remember the former things long past,
For I am God, and there is no other;
I am God, and there is no one like Me,
Declaring the end from the beginning,
And from ancient times things which have not been done,
Saying, ‘My purpose will be established,
And I will accomplish all My good pleasure’;
Calling a bird of prey from the east,
The man of My purpose from a far country.
Truly I have spoken; truly I will bring it to pass.
I have planned it, surely I will do it.

I love taking my IPad calendar and filling up every hour of every day with something. Some of the things I write down in some of the time slots are pretty general, such as, “yard work”, or “study”, but it is something. I read all of my 73 goals and then I do some calendar work, then I read my goals again and then fill in some more blanks in the calendar. I try to keep 10 months generally filled up, the next 6 months more so, and the closest 3 months totally planned. When I get 3 months completed I pray, “ Dear Lord Jesus, this is what I believe is your will for my life, and I am committed to pursuing it with all my might. If you want to direct me in a different way on anything that I have planned I am open and willing and I am listening and paying attention to any changes you want to make in my plans.”

Proverbs 16:3 Commit your works to the Lord
And your plans will be established.

Psalms 37:5 Commit your way to the Lord,
Trust also in Him, and He will do it.

Proverbs 16:9 The mind of man plans his way,
But the Lord directs his steps.

The rewards of planning as much of my future as possible is that I gain momentum and motivation reading what my plans are for the next day, the next week, and the next month. My use of time gets much more organized and precise having planned out my entire day ahead of time. I can anticipate problems, road blocks, and needs much more accurately and plan accordingly thus preventing them or at least be prepared to solve them as quickly as possible.

I know that there are some things that I do that very few people will ever start doing no matter how much I encourage them to pick up the discipline. Writing goals that cover most of your life and that will use up all of your time and energy, and then filling up the calendar with activities that are part of the strategy to accomplishing your goals seems like such a basic way to pursue a successful life, but very few do it and very few can be talked into doing it. I wonder why? I will keep trying.

John 11:11-14 Jesus said to His disciples, “Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep; but I go, so that I may awaken him out of sleep.” The disciples then said to Him, “Lord, if he has fallen asleep, he will recover.” Now Jesus had spoken of his death, but they thought that He was speaking of literal sleep. So Jesus then said to them plainly, “Lazarus is dead,”

Every night when I put my head on my pillow I say, “Lord Jesus, I know one of these days I am going to die just like I am going to sleep now, and instead of waking up and seeing Patty, I will wake up and see You. I am ready and anxious for that to happen. Please give me more to do for You tomorrow or take me home tonight, I only want to stay if it means fruitful labor for You.”

Praying that prayer every night does a couple of things for me. The first thing is that it takes away all fear of dying and therefore all fear, because the fear of dying is the soil all other fears grow out of. I am not afraid of COVID, I am not afraid of cancer, I am not afraid of Parkinson’s, and I am not afraid of failure. Declaring my faith in God every night, declaring my faith in His care for me and that He has my life planned out every night, declaring my faith in eternal life in heaven with Him every night, and declaring my desire to bear more fruit for Him every night results in my faith growing, my passion and fire to do more growing, and my joy growing.

Repeating basic truths often and regularly causes those truths to become dominate in our thinking and then to fill our heart, soul, or inner person making us strong, confident, and happy people. Proverbs 23:7 says, “what a person thinks about most of the time determines who they are.”

We can choose what we think about, the command to “set our qmind on the things above,” is given numerous times in the Bible. We can by default let the world and the people around us dictate what we think about. We can, by simple passivity, allow the devil and his demons to influence to a high degree what we think about. Or we can allow God to control our thinking by reading His Word the Bible faithfully, daily is best, and to systematically memorize it, the Bible is the very mind of Christ.

So I am choosing to think about death as a graduation into a wonderful life with Jesus, and the postponement of death to be many opportunities to do more for Him that matters for all eternity. I am choosing to do that every night when I go to sleep.