SURVIVAL GUIDE FOR THE END TIMES
What if you could see the Kingdom of God come to earth today?
“Perhaps today” Tom’s wooden sign on the wall
Everyone is intrigued by the notion of seeing the end.
A recent Netflix series called The Lazarus Project portrays a team of people who use a time machine to reset life after every world-ending crisis. A show like this is successful today because it mirrors our news feeds. Given modern technology, we live in the genuine possibility of cataclysmic war daily.
The question of our hearts is, is there really a Kingdom without end, and when will it arrive?
In the 70’s there was a massive revival of hippies called the Jesus Movement. One of the focuses of many of the Bible teachers at that time was the return of Christ and His coming Kingdom. Rightfully so.
Think about it, if there really is another Kingdom that’s going to come crashing into this world and establish a new reign and new order, wouldn’t you want to know about it? Would you live in light of it?
While many people are fascinated with the future, the New Testament authors shock us with something few are aware of. The biblical authors talk about the Kingdom of God not just in terms of its future coming—they’re about it as having already broken in. We are living now in what some scholars call the overlap of the ages. We’re not just waiting for the end of the world—we’re living in the middle of it.
The end is HERE:
Colossians 1:13 He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son…
Philippians 3:20–21 But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform our lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even to subject all things to himself.
1 Corinthians 10:11 Now these things happened to them as an example, but they were written down for our instruction, on whom the end of the ages has come.
Daniel 2:44–45 And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever…
WHAT KINGS?
“Those kings” most naturally refers to the kings of the fourth kingdom (Rome)
Two Parables
SOWER ROOTED & RESILIENT
MUSTARD SEED DARKER & BRIGHTER
01. ROOTED AND RESILIENT vv. 18–24
PATH SOIL - BLINDED BY DARKNESS
SHALLOW SOIL - CASUAL FAITH
THORN SOIL - DISTRACTED FAITH
GOOD SOIL - SOLID FAITH
God is purifying the church by permitting Christian leaders to be effectively persecuted.
→ Parable in of the wheat and tares
These weeds are probably darnel, a weedy rye grass with poisonous black seeds. Darnel resembles wheat in its early growth but is easily distinguished from it when full grown. Let both grow together (v. 30). Believers and unbelievers live side by side in the world until the day of judgment.
Who is legit is sifted at the end of the age. But how you know you’re the real thing today is whether you’re willing stay faithful under trial.
→ the true test of authentic faith is DO you STAY FAITHFUL UNDER TRIAL?
Proverbs 24:16 for the righteous falls seven times and rises again, but the wicked stumble in times of calamity.
The days of casual Christianity are coming to a close! People leave churches because they wanted the church to bigger or smaller or better coffee or to have direct access to the pastor or to have a certain style of worship. All of that is petty and self-serving. We’re moving into a season of Christianity in the West where your baptism might be a death sentence. This is what the death of Kirk recently cemented. → We’re in a new era of Christianity in the West.
But this is not the moment to STEP BACK IN FEAR but STEP UP FAITH.
In the movie Tombstone, when Wyatt Earp and his brothers run into Doc Holliday at a saloon in Arizona. They notice how pale and sickly he looks. Wyatt (Kurt Russell) or one of the others says something to the effect of: “You look like you’re all played out.” Doc, coughing and sweating from tuberculosis, flashes that sly grin and says:
“Not me. I’m in my prime.”
The point? That’s the ironic bravado of his character, and it’s why everyone loves him! He’s dying but still dangerous!
This is must be the posture of the church today! Just when the enemy is starting to kill Christians into silence we need to get MORE BOLD. Watch this: It’s When we’re dying that we’re most dangerous. The Blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church. It’s when we’re being persecuted that we’re in our prime!
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02. The world gets darker but the Kingdom burns brighter. (vv. 31–33)
Matthew 13:31–33
He put another parable before them, saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like a grain of mustard seed that a man took and sowed in his field. [32] It is the smallest of all seeds, but when it has grown it is larger than all the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and make nests in its branches.” [33] He told them another parable. “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and hid in three measures of flour, till it was all leavened.”
Daniel 4:20–22 The tree you saw, which grew and became strong, so that its top reached to heaven, and it was visible to the end of the whole earth, whose leaves were beautiful and its fruit abundant, and in which was food for all, under which beasts of the field found shade, and in whose branches the birds of the heavens lived— it is you, O king, who have grown and become strong. Your greatness has grown and reaches to heaven, and your dominion to the ends of the earth.
Mustard seed: starts smallest seed, grows to be the largest.
A tree with birds was already a picture of an expansive, global Kingdom.
Leaven: invisible at work, but eventually transforms the whole loaf.
01. THE KINGDOM IS GOING TO SPREAD UNSTOPPABLY UNTIL JESUS RETURNS.
02. WHEN YOU PLANT THE GOSPEL SEEDS, UNTHINKABLE KINGDOM POTENTIAL IS RELEASED.
👉 Application: The kingdom’s influence looks weak at first, but it is unstoppable. Faithfulness in small acts—discipleship, generosity, mission—creates impact far beyond what we see.
2 Timothy 3:1–5 But understand this, that in the last days there will come times of difficulty. [2] For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, [3] heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, [4] treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, [5] having the appearance of godliness, but denying its power. Avoid such people.
Some people think this time is going to be later. But that is defeated by Paul’s saying “avoid such people”. He assumes his hearers will meet them.
This is more likely an increasing reality than a future reality.
What should we DO as this evil increases?
2 Timothy 3:10–15 You, however, have followed my teaching, my conduct, my aim in life, my faith, my patience, my love, my steadfastness, [11] my persecutions and sufferings that happened to me at Antioch, at Iconium, and at Lystra—which persecutions I endured; yet from them all the Lord rescued me. [12] Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, [13] while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived. [14] But as for you, continue in what you have learned and have firmly believed, knowing from whom you learned it [15] and how from childhood you have been acquainted with the sacred writings, which are able to make you wise for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus
BE LOVING AND STEADFAST
LIVE
GODLY LIFE
ENDURE PERSECUTION
CONTINUE IN WHAT YOU HAVE LEARNED
STAY ACQUAINTED WITH THE SCRIPTURES
SALVATION STORY FROM THIS MONTH
"I’ve been in a hole that I’ve dug since I was 16. I said yes to Jesus before couple months but I never meant it until recently following Charlie’s death and the real demons that live in the world. I’ve felt distant from Jesus and living my own life on my own but knowing that I need Jesus now. I I never grew up in a church house… I don’t know what to do about having Christ as my foundation?…I know I can’t do this life alone and I need God to lead me, so that I can lead my family..”