A0288_The Approaching Storm
Date: 11th February 2007 (Sunday PM) Ref: A0288
Place: Kambah P.S.
Title: The Approaching Storm
Text: & Matthew 24:36-39
Illust: Last night we were at the CSO prom Concert in the Grounds of Government House. Sitting listening to classical music & watching people eat. Amazing how much attention you pay to what others are eating when you are fasting – Cheese & Biscuits, Ribbon sandwiches, chicken, chips, dips, wines champagne & even a chocolate Cake. People out enjoying themselves, living well, having fun. Just before the interval I was up the front & I noticed that some dark clouds were heading our way and starting to build. Then the wind started to pick-up, the clouds got blacker, a young man was putting plastic bags over some of the speakers. I am thinking it looks like the storm is coming. I noticed just a few people mixed in the crowd pack-up & quietly start to leave. The signs were all there. Just as the 2nd half started we packed up & hurriedly left. Only us & a few others.
I. Approaching Storm Clouds
A. Australia
i. I want you to know this evening that there is an approaching storm. The dark clouds are gathering.
We see the Greens leader Bob Brown claiming we have to shut down the coal industry because of the green religions coming apocalypse of global warming.
A number of Greens & Democrat senators writing a letter to the Venezuelan dictator Hugo Chavez congratulating him on achieving complete power & inviting him to Australia
The continual push for Same Sex marriage
The explosion of the drug ICE into our youth
ii. And I could go on. You just need to look around to see that our society is fracturing & cannot continue as it is going much longer
2 Timothy 3:2-4 2 For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, 3 unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, 4 traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, (NKJV)
B. Global
i. As bad as things are here, they are exceedingly worse in many parts of the world.
Zimbabwe's economy is facing immanent collapse. President Robert Mugabe's regime is facing a disintegrating army and police, a wave of strikes, power black-outs and the breakdown of every essential service. Inflation is running at 1,281 per cent – the highest rate in the world.
Tehran on top of actively pursuing nuclear weapons is supplying Iraqi insurgents and Lebanese Hezbollah forces.
The new Palestinian ‘Unity’ government of Hamas & Fatah in Israel will not accept past accords, including peace agreements the Palestinian Liberation Organization signed with Israel.
Europe is rapidly becoming Islamic & is finding itself struggling with home-grown radical islamists
ii. Again, I could go on & on! All over the globe the storm clouds are gathering
Matthew 24:6-8 6 And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you are not troubled; for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet. 7 For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom. And there will be famines, pestilences, and earthquakes in various places. 8 All these are the beginning of sorrows. (NKJV)
II. The Masses
A. Do Not See
i. The frightening truth this PM is that actually the signs are all there, but the vast majority don’t see them for what they are.
Matthew 16:3 and in the morning, ‘It will be foul weather today, for the sky is red and threatening.’ Hypocrites! You know how to discern the face of the sky, but you cannot discern the signs of the times. (NKJV)
ii. Really obvious that a storm was coming last night, yet the vast majority of people were still sitting there as we left & showed no signs of moving, they were enjoying the moment. This is the same as life, most people although they see the signs, they even recognise them for what they are, yet something deep inside is saying, it won’t happen to me, I’m ok.
iii. This is what we see in our text. & vs.38 – People living life, enjoying life, taking no account of the signs around them. – In Noah’s day there was the whopping great big Ark on his front lawn. – Today we have the testimony of the Word of God and the signs all around us.
B. And are Overtaken
i. I told Janine to start walking with the kids while I packed up the chairs, as I was hurrying to catch up, 3 men were standing off to the side, drinking their beers & one said to me “O ye of little faith, aren’t you going to stop here with the rest of us?” – I laughed & kept walking. – By the time we were still 100m from the car the 1st few intermittent drops had started to sprinkle us, by the time we reached the car, it was starting to come down. As I closed the door, down she really came. On the drive home it was a major deluge.
ii. As we drove home all we cold think of was those who were ‘left behind’. – Would not have been pleasant, absolute pandemonium is probably more accurate. It was incredible enough, safe in the car & house. For those with young kids, the elderly, those who hadn’t packed up, it would have been horrendous. I kept thinking about the chocolate cake.
iii. & vs.39 – They failed to heed the warnings & were taken away, they perished.
III. The Wise
A. Only a Handful
i. It was only a few people that saw the signs for what they represented & took action. You couldn’t miss the signs yet only a few acted. I could have sat there & thought ‘well no-one else is moving, just a couple of worriers, surely therefore nothing is really going to happen’
ii. How much like our times this is, we sometimes may be seduced into thinking, if this is so obvious why doesn’t everybody see & respond? Last night I witnessed an object lesson on the human condition.
iii. A few, a mere handful saw & said we are getting out of here. – This is to be your constant companion. Tempted to do other than the call of God, look at the storm clouds brewing, “nope I am getting out of here” Note that others might even try to stop you, to mock you.
Matthew 7:13 “Enter by the narrow gate; for wide is the gate and broad is the way that leads to destruction, and there are many who go in by it. (NKJV)
B. Cry Out
i. There is one thing that I realise last night that I didn’t do that I maybe should have. I didn’t warn anyone, I didn’t try to convince, exhort, rebuke to warn of the coming storm. We just quietly packed up & left.
ii. How much is that like the church today, we see the storm clouds coming yet we are content to let the storm come knowing that we are going to be saved from the ferocity of it by the rapture of the church.
iii. We have a task, a job to do. That is to warn, everybody to tell them, to point out the signs & do everything in our power to get them to receive Jesus so that they too escape the coming storm. – Yes you will be in the minority but still we are called to do what needs to be done. – Sound out a warning
iv. We have a sobering warning, I want to leave you with this evening from & Ezek 33:1-6 Verse 6, makes it clear, God holds us who see accountable for sounding the alarm.