Friend, Will You Be Ready? is a sermon teaching us that Jesus Christ promised to come again, and He told us to be ready for His return.

 

Key verses
Matthew 24:36-42

We are once again turning to Matthew chapter 24. In our Sunday School class, we looked at a portion of Matthew 24, this morning, another part of Matthew 24, and this evening another, and we still have not exhausted Matthew 24. But in Matthew 24 this evening, eventually, we will be looking at verses 36 to 42. But right now, I just want us to look at verse 42:

Matthew 24:42: “Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.”

We talk about being ready for Jesus to come. I told you this morning about the song that was written so many years ago in 1956, “Behold, He comes! And every eye shall see him! Friend, will you be ready when Jesus comes?” And that’s the question we want to look at this evening. What does it mean to be ready for Jesus to come?

Jesus Promised to Return

Those of us who take the Bible literally understand that the Lord Jesus has promised to come again. We talked about that this morning. John 14:3, He said:

John 14:3: “And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also.”

I want to share with you a couple of other verses that have to do with the Lord’s return. I want to talk to you about Acts 1:10-11. At this point, the disciples decided to ask Jesus, “Lord, wilt thou at this time restore again the kingdom to Israel?” Jesus said:

Acts 1:7: “And he said unto them, It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath put in his own power.”

Acts 1:8: “But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost is come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth.”

It took them a while, but sometime after that, they went out to be witnesses. Do you know where they went? Jerusalem, Judaea, Samaria, and to the uttermost parts of the earth. That was verse eight. In verses 10 and eleven, Luke writes:

Acts 1:10: “And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel;”

Acts 1:11: “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 ye have seen him go into heaven.”

In Titus 2:13, Paul writes:

Titus 2:13: “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;”

Again, Paul writes in Philippians 3:20:

Philippians 3:20: “For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ:”

Revelation 22:12, Jesus says:

Revelation 22:12: “And, behold, I come quickly; and my reward is with me, to give every man according as his work shall be.”

Verse 20 of the same chapter:

Revelation 22:20: “He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.”

That’s the last prayer of the Bible.

When Will Jesus Return?

The Lord has told us to be ready at His coming, to get ready. Well, how do you get ready for an event like that? There is so much there. If we went into chapter 25, there’s even more of what it means to be ready. But I want you to look at His teaching. In Matthew 24:36

Matthew 24:36: “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.”

We made reference to this this morning, but we really didn’t talk about it. We don’t know exactly when the Lord is going to come. I was talking to brother Clark before the service, and he was showing me a map of India and how he and others had ministered in India for 20 years and all the places they had gone to train pastors and other Christian workers to spread the Gospel in India.

And he said that now the government of India is concerned because so many people are becoming Christians that they feel Hinduism might be threatened. I understand that from their nationalistic viewpoint but from a spiritual viewpoint, that is a good thing.

I shared with him similar things about China, about how the church in China is the fastest-growing church on the planet. You wouldn’t think that, but it is. I do know this from personal experience from talking to many of them. Asian churches – I say Asian because it is not limited to one country – are sending out more missionaries than the U.S. is. There are many reasons for that. One, churches in Asia are growing, but two, and don’t miss this, people from Asian countries can get into countries that Americans cannot get into.

For example, if you were to go to a Muslim-controlled country and say, “I’m American, and I’d like to come in here and preach the Gospel.” They’ll say, “No way. You’re not coming to our country.” But if a Chinese person goes there, then they’ll say, “You’re from China? Come on in.” It doesn’t really work that way. Well, you can, not exactly, but pretty close. These things happen from firsthand testimonies of people in these churches, pastors, and others in these churches.

Years ago – over 20 years ago now, Pastor Chris and I and about 11 other people were over in Japan, and we met there a medical doctor who was getting ready to go on the mission field and go into other countries with the Gospel. So much of that is happening in the world today. We hear from the Islamic countries themselves that many people, many people coming to the Lord, and many coming to trust the Lord Jesus. There is testimony after testimony of that.

Now, when I hear that, and I shared this with brother Clark, it sounds like we are getting close. It sounds like we are getting close to where people are getting saved and in countries where missionaries don’t get in easily, where the Gospel is not prevalent, and there are not a great many churches. Again, it was over 20 years ago, but when we were in Japan and Japan at that time, I don’t know how it is today, but they had more religious freedom than the United States had. They did, and I could tell you stories about that.

We’d be traveling around the country on a train or on a bus, and you’re going along and say, “Look, a church.” You don’t even know what kind of church it is. It could be a Catholic church or a Mormon church. It could be something else. You just see a church, and why would you point that out? Because there are so few churches there of any kind. Just to see a church of any kind was amazing.

That’s where the Tajimas labor to work. Of course, brother Tajima was Japanese. His wife is still there, and we ask you to pray for the Koriyama Baptist Church and the work that goes on there since brother Tajima has gone to be with the Lord. They have a church there, they have a camp ministry, they have a school for training folks for the ministry, and they need a pastor. They need someone to come in and take that work and lead it.

How Close is Christ’s Return?

But all this we are telling you because for everything I told you just now and everything I told you this morning, how close is the coming of the Lord? Well, look again at verse 36:

Matthew 24:36: “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.”

“But of that day and hour knoweth no man,” – over the years, many people have come along and said, “I’ve got it. I’ve got it figured out. I know when He’s coming.” There was a fellow years ago who wrote a book that was a big seller titled “88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Be in 1988.” What do you think he was right? No, he missed it. He missed it entirely. Many other people through the years said, “I’ve done my math, and I’ve done my research and everything. I know when the Lord is coming.

Look at verse 36 again, “But of that day and hour knoweth no man,” – the fellow who wrote that book didn’t know. I don’t know. No man knows. Look at 36 again, “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven,” – notice that. Not only does no man know, no human being knows the Lord’s coming. The angels in heaven don’t know the Lord’s coming. Who knows? Well, look at it again:

Matthew 24:36: “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.”

God knows. And He will come when the time is right. Remember the prophecy we looked at last month talking about the first coming of the Lord? Remember the prophecy? But when the fullness, the time has come, God sent forth His Son. That’s in Galatians. The Lord knows when the time is right and when the time is right, He’ll come.

But there are some clues He gave us in Matthew. I do want to say this before we go any further. I said it this morning, but I want to reiterate it tonight. The prophecies in Matthew 24 and 25 can have a dual fulfillment. By that, we mean we talked about how Jesus is coming again and again. He’s coming for the rapture of the church. He’s coming to take His people out of this world before the Great Tribulation. At the end of the Tribulation, He’s coming again to the earth to set up the millennial kingdom, the 1,000-year kingdom where He’ll reign over all the earth from Jerusalem. That’s what we mean when we say Jesus is coming again and again. So, the prophecies in Matthew 24 and 25, some of them can refer to the rapture, and some of them can refer to the coming at the end of the Tribulation for the kingdom.

Let me interject something, I told you this recently, but I’ll tell you again, in the Gospel of Matthew, you will find the phrase “kingdom of heaven.” You do not find that phrase in any other book of the Bible. Sixty-five other books of the Bible, and you won’t find that phrase in any of them. You’ll find “kingdom of God” and other similar statements, but you do not find the phrase “kingdom of heaven.”

Matthew was writing to the people of Israel, and the main thrust of his Gospel was to show them that Jesus is indeed the Messiah who was promised to come. So, when he writes about the kingdom of heaven, he uses that phrase. He’s talking about the earthly reign of the Messiah, that 1,000-year millennium.

Indications of Christ’s Return

So, in verse 37, we don’t know when He’s coming, but there are things we can look for, indications:

Matthew 24:37: “But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”

What’s it going to be like before Jesus comes? It’s going to be like the days of Noah. It’s going to be like that time. What was that like? Well, Jesus tells us.

Matthew 24:38: “For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,”

Matthew 24:39: “And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”

In other words, life on earth before the flood was business as usual. People were carrying on with their daily activities. Noah, we’re told, preached for over 100 years. Man, he must have been old. He was. But he preached for over a hundred years, and he was telling people that there’s going to come a great flood, there’s going to come a disaster, and you need to get right with God. You need to give your heart to God.

The world, in general, rejected the message. Now, think about that. Noah told them that the Lord was going to send rain, and this rain was going to bring about a flood on the earth. It wasn’t just the rain, it rained 40 days and 40 nights, but if you read the story carefully, it also says the fountains of the deep were broken up. So, there were undersea earthquakes. Perhaps volcanic eruptions brought out the water, the ocean. It was a little combination of things that God used to flood the entire world.

I told you this recently, and I won’t go over it again, but secular scientists are beginning to acknowledge that, yes, there was a worldwide flood. They are not giving God credit for it. They are not ready to do that, but they are saying that it did happen. What’s amazing about that is until recently, they all denied that. They said no, that there were great local floods all over the planet, but there was no worldwide flood. But now, some of them are beginning to say yes, there actually was a worldwide flood. Why did they do that? Because the evidence is so strong that it did happen, and they can’t deny it.

But look at the days of Noah. Verse 38 again:

Matthew 24:38: “For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,”

They were having weddings, having their daily lives, having meals with their families and friends, probably going to work in the daytime, educating their children, and making plans for the future. And then, one day, it rained. I don’t know if you ever realized this, but if you read through the first six chapters of Genesis, by the time we get to the flood. In the first six chapters of Genesis, it had never rained at that point.

The earth was surrounded by a vapor canopy which shielded the earth from some of the sun’s radio waves [solar radiation], and people lived longer. How much longer? About ten times longer than people do today. They weren’t affected in some of the same ways we are. The atmosphere was different. You talk about climate change; this was climate change. And it changed again. Do you want to know what climate change, global warming is going to look like? I encourage you to read Peter. He’ll tell you all about it.

But the fact of the matter is when God sent the flood, that vapor canopy let go, and it rained for the first time. I’m sure people didn’t know what that was. What is happening? What is this water falling out of the sky? And yet, it was global, water coming down from the sky, and the sea level did rise. As we said, the fountains of the deep were broken up.

The flood came, and what happened? Verse 39:

Matthew 24:39: “And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”

It’s going to be at a time when people think not. All life went as usual, it says in verse 38 until the day Noah entered the ark. Preachers preach today, and they proclaim the message that Jesus is coming again. And you know what people say, “Yeah, you’ve been telling us that forever.” You say it and say it, and it hasn’t happened.

Now, there are many reasons as to why that is true and why people reject the message. Let me just give you a couple. We’d be here all night if I tried to give all of them. But let me give you a couple of reasons why people reject that message. Number one, things like I told you before. A fellow writes a book, “88 Reasons Why the Rapture Will Come in 1988,” and it doesn’t happen. And people say, “You know what, you preachers have been saying it.” You know what? 1988 was a long time ago.

Before that book was written in the 1970s, I was working at Fort Bluff Camp in Dayton, Tennessee. We had a preacher there from Texas, and he preached heavily on the return of the Lord. After a service one evening, I spoke to him, and I said, “Let me ask you something, with everything you’re seeing in the 1970s, how long do you think we’ve got?”

Here’s his answer. He said, “Well, I don’t want to be pegged as a date setter. He was wise in that. He said, “If I name a date, I could be wrong, and that would look foolish.” And it would be. He said, “Well, I don’t want to be pegged as a date setter, but the way that the world is going in the 1970s, I don’t see it happening much past 1980.” Folks, it’s much past 1980, isn’t it?

Let me take you back before that. Charles Taze Russell, some of you will know that name. He founded an organization named the Millennial Dawnists. He preached and taught that Jesus was coming in 1914. Jesus didn’t come in 1914. So, he came back and changed the date to a later date. Jesus didn’t come on that date. So, he changed the date again. He passed off the scene, and his followers changed the date again and again. They don’t call that group Millenial Dawnists anymore. They call them Jehovah’s Witnesses.

I’m not here to make fun of people. I’m not here to tell you how wrong these people were except to tell you no man knows the day or the hour. One of the reasons people don’t listen when we say Jesus is coming again is because they say, “You’ve been telling us that for decades. You’ve been telling us that for centuries. Hasn’t happened.” That’s true. It hasn’t.

But can I share something with you? The fact that something has not happened doesn’t mean it never will. I’ve used this illustration before but let me use it again. I’ve never died. That surprised you, didn’t it? I’ve never died, but I’m pretty sure someday I will. This never happened, but I’m pretty sure it will. Unless the Lord comes first, one day, that is going to happen. “Are you planning on it real soon?” No, I’m not. But that brings us to another thing. Go to verse 39 again:

Matthew 24:39: “And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”

It is at a time when we’re not expecting it and when the world is not looking for it. When the world does not expect Him to come, He’ll come. What is it going to be like? Look at verse 40:

Matthew 24:40: “Then shall two be in the field; the one shall be taken, and the other left.”

Matthew 24:41: “Two women shall be grinding at the mill; the one shall be taken, and the other left.”

What’s he talking about? He is talking about a time when people are at work, and the Lord comes. All of a sudden, one of them is just gone. Will you see them go up? I’m going to say probably not. “Why don’t you think we won’t see them go up?” Because Paul tells us in 1 Corinthians 15 that it will happen in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye. And that phrase “twinkling of an eye” is not a misinterpretation that it means the speed of light, 186,000 miles per second.

You don’t see light travel, but it’s been measured. We could go on about that. Light travels at a different speed in a vacuum than it does in the atmosphere, and so forth. There is a lot there. We don’t have time to get into all that. But light in our atmosphere travels about 186,000 miles per second. If someone is leaving at that speed, you’re not going to see them. One second, they will be there, and the next second they will be gone. Where’d they go? Jesus came.

Matthew 24:42: “Watch therefore: for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come.”

You don’t know when He is coming. We sang that earlier, “Jesus is coming again … maybe morning, maybe noon, maybe evening, maybe soon … Jesus is coming again.”

Before my father was saved, we were sitting together at a service in Chattanooga, and they sang that song in the service, and he said to me, “I like that song.” He didn’t trust the Lord yet. He did eventually, but at that point, he hadn’t trusted the Lord. He said, “I like that song.” Jesus is coming again.

Preparing for the Lord’s Return

So, how do we get ready for the Lord to come? How are we going to prepare ourselves? Well, Jesus tells us this in verse 43:

Matthew 24:43: “But know this, that if the goodman of the house had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have suffered his house to be broken up.”

Matthew 24:44: “Therefore be ye also ready: for in such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh.”

What’s He saying there? He’s saying to be ready every day. Be constantly ready, be constantly on guard. So, how do you do that? Let me give you just a few things, and we will be finished tonight.

Number one: You must be 100% sure of your salvation. If you are not 100% sure of your salvation, you’re not ready for Jesus to come. If there’s even a doubt in your mind that He will come and you’re going with Him. If there’s even a shadow of a doubt that when you die, you’ll go with Him and be taken to Heaven, then you need to get that settled. You need to have 100% certainty that you are born again. You’ve trusted Christ as your Savior that when He comes or if you go by death, you are going to go to be with the Lord.

If you’re not sure of that, that’s part of the main ministry of this church, and any Bible-believing church is to help you get ready for that. There are two main ministries of the church. Number one is to help people to be saved, to show them how to be saved. Number two is to help Christians to grow. Those are the two main ministries of the local church. You must be 100% sure of salvation.

Number two: We need to live a life that is a testimony of the Savior. Honestly, if I am living in a very sinful way, if I am living in a very hypocritical way, and I’m telling you that you need Jesus to save you and change your life. How likely are you going to listen to me? Not much. You’re going to look at me and say, “Jesus has done a lot for you.”

No, we need to be busy living a life of testimony for the Savior. What Jesus meant when he said, “Let your light so shine before men that they see your good works and glorify your Father which is in Heaven.” – our life should point people to the Savior. They should notice a difference in you and me, that we are not like everybody else. They should notice that we have certain qualities in our life that are not natural to us, that are not our own, but because the Lord gave them to us.

I was talking to somebody today, and they talked about a certain area where they liked to hire a certain religious group, and it’s not Baptist, I assure you. A group they like to hire from, why? Because they know they are moral people. For the most part, they don’t have a criminal background. They live a good character, they are likely to tell the truth, and are good moral people. Who are these people? We are talking about the Mormons.

You know what? Why don’t they think that about Baptists? It’s not the Mormons’ fault that they don’t think that about the Baptists now, is it? No, it isn’t. You see, we ought to be that kind of people. We ought to be the kind of people that say, “You know what? I know where they come from. I know their background. We’ll hire that person.”

When I was at Chattanooga at Tennessee Temple University, they had a testimony like that. I was working for the Chattanooga public school system, and I worked for them as a driver, they had had a number of thefts in their yard, and I don’t mean little things, like heavy equipment being stolen, big things. And they didn’t want to hire a security company at that point. There were a number of Tennessee Temple students who worked for the public schools as drivers.

Our boss called us together one day and said, “We want you Tennessee Temple guys to stay here all night, take shifts but stay here all night, and stand guard because we know we can trust you. Why? Christians. That’s the kind of testimony we should all have. We should have a testimony that points people to the Savior.

Number three: We need to be busy. We need to be busy witnessing for the Lord. We need to be working hard to bring others to Him. How can we do that? Pass out tracks. Talk to people one-on-one, help people to come to know – brother Clark will tell you to use the wordless book. That’s a good way, that’s a very good way. Lots of people come to the Lord that way.

When we went to Japan, brother Chris and I and the others took with us a whole bagful. A lady in our church made them, a whole bag of wordless books. What is a wordless book, some of you are thinking? It’s a book that has no words, pretty simple, isn’t it? Ask brother Clark to explain it to you. He’ll be glad to. It is a book that has colored pages, and those colored pages help you tell the Gospel story. I tell you to ask him. He’ll tell it better than I will. I encourage you to do that. We need to be busy trying to bring others to Him.

We need to be busy helping people who mourn. A lot of people are mourning today. Yes, they mourn. They mourn the death of a loved one. I got a call just minutes ago before the service about somebody who wants to have a funeral service here. If all goes well, Monday morning, I’ll be having a funeral at the National cemetery. Nothing unusual about that. These kinds of things happen often. We need to be busy to comfort those who mourn.

Number four: We need to be working to help believers grow. How are we going to be that testimony we ought to be? How are we going to be people who people look at and say, “You can trust them,” if we are not mature spiritually? We need to be growing. What is the goal of Christian growth? Grow to be like Jesus, to be like Him.

Dr. Parker stood here, and he said, “When I get to Heaven, I’m going to finally be like Jesus. I worked so long and so hard to be like Him, then I’ll finally be like Him.” And that’s true. All of us should be able to say that. “I worked so long and so hard to be like Him. Not working for your salvation – you’re working on your spiritual growth. We need to grow to be more like the Lord in every aspect.

We Are to Be Ready

We must not wait in the sense of just sitting. There is no time for that. What if the Lord doesn’t come in the next 12 months? I think He could, but there is no way to know that for sure. He may not come in the next 12 months. I don’t want to discourage you, but He may not come in the next 12 years. We don’t know. We’ve already covered that. But what I do know is this, He is coming, and He told us to be ready. Let’s not wait in the sense of just sitting.

I’ll give you some other scriptures:

Mark 13:35: “Watch ye therefore: for ye know not when the master of the house cometh, at even, or at midnight, or at the cockcrowing, or in the morning:”

Luke 12:40: “Be ye therefore ready also: for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.”

1 Corinthians 1:7: “So that ye come behind in no gift; waiting for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ:”

Philippians 3:20: “For our conversation is in heaven; from whence also we look for the Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ:”

1 Thessalonians 1:10: “And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come.”

Titus 2:13: “Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;”

James 5:8: “Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts: for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.”

When He comes, He’ll take us home. When He comes, we’ll be with Him forever. We’ll come back with Him to reign with the saints in the kingdom. But when He comes, He’ll take us home. When He comes and establishes His kingdom, then there will finally be peace on earth. The sin curse will be taken away. Read Romans chapter eight and understand that. He will come personally and bodily. The question is, will you be ready?

We sang the song a while ago, “When We All Get to Heaven.” And as we sing that song, I want to encourage you to think about those words. “Sing the wondrous song of Jesus, Sing His mercy and His grace.” The Lord must come to rescue His people. “When we all get to Heaven, What a day of rejoicing that will be! When we all see Jesus, We’ll sing and shout the victory!”

He’s going to come and rescue us, take us out of the world before judgment comes. He’s going to judge this world as He did in the days of Noah, but He is going to take His people out to take them home before He pours out His judgment so that we will be spared from that. The question again is, are you ready?

~~~~~~~

Father, thank you so much for blessing us. Thank you for each and every soul who is here tonight, those who are listening, and those who may be listening later. Help us, Lord, to be ready, to be serving you daily and fully, to be the testimony that we ought to be. And Lord, use us, we pray, to point other people to the Savior.

Our heads are bowed, and our eyes are closed. As we normally do, we are going to sing a hymn of invitation. If God has spoken to your heart, there’s a spiritual need in your life, I’ll be down the front, and I’ll be glad to meet you there. There are other folks here tonight who can help you and will be glad to pray with you. You just come as the Lord leads you. Father, bless and move in this invitation time. We do pray in Jesus’ name. Amen.

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