[0:01]Please open your Bibles to Daniel chapter 7. Uh Daniel chapter 11, I'm sorry. While you're turning there, just so that you get a grasp of of how extraordinary it is, what you just heard. There's a veteran missionary that I know who has is still alive and still serving in Peru near 70 years. And when I first went there, he told me this. He said, young man, if in 40 years, if in 40 years of ministry, God enables you to plant four real churches, then your life will have been an astounding miracle. What you heard here just now from these two missionaries was astounding. You can do so many things on the mission field. You can you can evangelize, you can you can count heads and hands. But to plant a church is extraordinary. It's an impossibility and it can only be done by the preaching of the gospel and the power of God. And so what you heard, that many churches, that many people, it's beyond speech. And you need to recognize that and you also need to recognize that if you are helping them, you had a part in that miracle, those miracles. Now, let's look at Daniel.
[2:00]Chapter 11, verse 32. By smooth words he will turn to godlessness those who act wickedly toward the covenant. But the people who know their God will display strength and take action. Let us pray. Father, thank you for what we have already heard. What grace you have given to your servants, both men and women. We praise you, oh God. But I pray now, Lord, for those in this congregation who are hearing. Oh God, give them ears to hear. God strengthen me. Help me. For their sake, for Christ's sake, oh God, so many words, so many sermons. But oh Lord, a display of your power. Oh God, please. We need thee, oh God. God do a work, especially among the men, the young men. Oh God, do a work. Help us in Jesus name. Amen.
[3:41]Now, the text that I I just read has a great deal to do with eschatology and there's a great deal of debate around what's going on here. And I'll leave that to the scholars. I want to touch on only one thing. Here we see a person of extraordinary evil. that comes against the people of God in an extraordinary time of evil. So regardless of how we take this text, we can see its application to us today. By smooth words he will turn to godlessness those who act wickedly toward the covenant, but the people who know their God will display strength and take action. This is always the case. The prophet lamented, He said, my people are destroyed for a lack of knowledge.
[4:43]The last few years I have seen things in this country. I have seen things globally that I thought my eyes would never see. There is an extraordinary evil. There is an extraordinary darkness. If you could imagine a a type of tsunami a thousand miles high and a thousand miles wide of just pitch black darkness that seems to be moving ever closer at an ever increasing speed. A grotesque immorality, an opposition to the gospel, a hatred for our Lord. And so we can identify with this text, but here's what I want you to see. God does not call for us in these times to circle the wagons and hide with fear and await some great event. He calls us to go forward. It doesn't say here that those who know their God will survive. It says, those who know their God will display strength and take action. Now, I want you to know that here in the church, in the seminary, TMAI, there are extraordinary men and women who are working. Men and women who know their God. As a matter of fact, many times if if I have a question or a problem, I am prone to call some of them. But I'm not talking to them tonight. I'm talking to you. I'm talking to you as a church. I'm talking to you as a layperson. I'm talking to you who's just been recently converted. And what I want you, if I could, I would take your your face in my hands and I would pull you close and I would say, listen to me. These are troubled times. These are terrible times, but borrowing from Dickens, I can say, these are the worst of times, these are the best of times. In the midst of a first century darkness, you and I have the opportunity to live like first century Christians, but only if we know our God. Only if we lay aside all those silly little distractions and even lay aside a multitude of activity that amounts to nothing. And concentrate on the priorities, and those priorities are this to know your God. When we look through church history, we see extraordinary men and extraordinary women of devotion and courage, the willingness to give absolutely everything. What makes them different? Why are they so strange? Why do they appear as an anomaly? What is the reason? Were they born of better stock than us? Absolutely not. They were born of Adam. Were they born again with a better spirit? No, God does not show partiality with his children. Then what is the difference? Here is the difference. If you look at them and you see courage, and you see passion, and you see discipline, it is only because they know more of God, they know more of Christ, they know more of the payment than the average believer. And that came to them because they sought it. They sought it in the scriptures, they sought it in prayer. They wanted to know him. You see, the weakest man in the world can become strong. The most useless servant can become extraordinary. But it is only to the degree that they know their God, and principally, they know their God in the person and work of Jesus Christ.
[9:03]He is absolutely everything. He cannot be sounded in his power and his beauty and his glory and his love for his people. The depth of what he suffered for us on that tree cannot be grasped by men or angels, only in the mind of God is it correctly understood. There is a wealth for us of strength in that knowledge. There is a wealth for us of motivation in that knowledge. To know him, to know him. That is the great motivation of the Christian life. That is the great motivation. And yet there is another. Look over in chapter 12. Look at verse 2. Many of those who sleep in the dust of the ground will awake. These to everlasting life, but the others to disgrace and everlasting contempt. Those who have insight will shine brightly like the brightness of the expanse of heaven and those who lead them many to righteousness like the stars forever and ever. If it wouldn't appear rude, I would stomp my foot several times to get your attention. I I need you to see this. I don't care who you are. Your life as a believer is extraordinary. The things you claim to believe are fantastic but true. We're not talking here about your best life now. We're talking about heaven, hell, life, death, eternal contempt or eternal glory.
[11:00]And there's glory to be won. There's glory to be had.
[11:10]I want you to turn over just for a moment and look at Romans. Chapter 2 where the Christian life is described. This is one of the most neglected passages. I don't know why it's neglected. It is it is extraordinarily powerful. Romans chapter 2 and verse 6. Speaking of God who will render to each person according to his deeds. Now, he describes the Christian life. The Christian to those who by perseverance in doing good. Look what they seek for. They seek for glory and honor and immortality. It sounds Spartan. It sounds like it should be written on a shield or a sword or a piece of armor. But it's written for you.
[12:13]Christ never says that we should not seek glory. He just focuses our attention not to ever seek glory from men, but to seek glory the glory from God. To one day hear your name called to drop your sword.
[12:40]To lay aside your scars and your pain and all the battle wounds and cross that threshold to hear, well done, my good and faithful servant. Enter into the joy of your master.
[13:00]You say, well, I'm not a missionary. I'm not this. I'm not that.
[13:07]Whoever said that mattered. Who ever told you that? The Glass family, borrowing from William Kerry, I can say this, and many other missionaries with TMAI and with grace and on and on. They went down into the well for the sake of Christ. You are called to hold the rope for those who go down. And either way, whether you go down in the well as a missionary, or you hold the rope for those who go down, there will be scars on your hands. Church, show me your scars. There should be scars. Scars to glory in. At what it has cost you to follow him, to serve him. So that over every inch of this globe, the flag of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ flies. In Peru, there's a statement. The only reason you're alive is because air is free. And the whole point with that statement is so many people live without any purpose. But you, look at you. Glory and honor. Immortality. The privilege to be able to invest your entire life in that which you can never lose for an incorruptible King and an incorruptible kingdom. There are kings and warriors and noblemen and philosophers who never had the privilege that you possess.
