Dr Greg Bahnsen - New Year's Messages: Temptations of Time (2 Peter 3) (Part 2)

This morning we turn for our Scripture lesson to the book of Second Peter toward the end of the New Testament, second Peter, chapter three, where I would like to read for you the first 13 verses. We begin reading at second Peter 3. 1. Hear now the Word of God. This is now, beloved, the second epistle that I write unto you. And in both of them I stir up your sincere mind by putting you in remembrance that you should remember the words which were spoken before by the holy prophets, and the commandment of the Lord and Savior through your apostles, knowing this first, that in the last days mockers shall come with mockery, walking after their own lust, and saying, where is the promise of his coming? For from the day that the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of creation. For this they willfully forget that there were heavens from of old, and an earth compacted out of water, and amidst water, by the word of God, by which means the world that then was being overflowed with water perished. But the heavens that now are, and the earth by the same word, have been stored up for fire, being reserved against the day of judgment and destruction of ungodly men. But forget not this one thing, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as as one day. The Lord is not slack concerning his promise, as some count slackness, but is longsuffering to you ward, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Seeing that these things are thus all to be dissolved, what manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy living and godliness, looking for and earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God, by reason of which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. But according to his promise, we look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness and thus far the reading of God's word. It's time for New Year's resolutions, isn't that right? It's the first day of the year, and we have by God's providence an opportunity to worship him on the very first day of the year. And it would seem appropriate then for us to stop and think about a few resolutions that we should make for the new year. But I've decided not to do that. I've decided we should rather stop and think about why we make resolutions on this day of the year. Why don't we make resolutions on the 19th day of September? You say, why should we make resolutions on the 19th day of September? There's nothing special about that particular day. After all, why don't we make resolutions on the 7th day of March? Well, those who are history buffs may think there's something significant about the 7th day of March, but not significant enough to make any resolutions for our personal living. Why is it that we single out this particular day for resolutions? We do so because we change the calendar. And we don't just, you see, switch one page on the calendar, turn it for another month. We throw the other calendar, the old calendar, away, and we start a new one. This is a day of new beginnings. It's a new year. We're starting all over again, or so we think. It's at this particular time, we stop and think about time, the passage of time and its effect upon us, upon our lives, how we are spending our time, how we are using our time, what we want to get out of time. And so I want to think about time this morning. I want to think about the beginning of a new year and consider especially the temptations that time presents to the Christian believer, the temptations that are before us as we think about the passage of time. And although I'm no Aristotelian, I think you'll find out that as we go through our morning exhortation, we're going to see that we have a golden mean, that we're going to have to try to walk in, because the temptation is to fall on one side of the road or the other when it comes to the passage of time, to think either that time is moving too fast or that time is moving too slow. Peter tells us in second Peter 3 of the Lord of Time. We have this well known verse, verse 8 of chapter 3, in which Peter says, forget not this one thing, beloved. That one day is with the Lord is a thousand years, and a thousand years is one day. As we reflect upon the passage of time, the most important thing we can say as Christians is God is not subject to time as we are. Peter says, forget not this one thing, that God does not relate to time in the same way that you do. See, if God did, then some of this reasoning that Peter is refuting in this chapter might begin to make some sense. But God doesn't experience time the way we do. Now we have to be very careful because at this Point, it's easy for Bible believing Christians to fall into very slippery, ambiguous and I think, misleading ways of thought. In an attempt to be, I guess, somewhat profound about our metaphysical convictions, we can say, well, we don't believe that God is in time, God is outside of time. And with that little slogan, God is outside of time, a world of good or a world of mischief can be done theologically. For instance, if we mean when we say that God is, quote, outside of time, that thereby everything is simultaneous to God. In fact, some who we might have expected to be better theologians have recently written that sort of thing in our own reformed circles have said that as a matter of fact, God lives in an eternal present, as though what happened many years ago is happening currently for God, even as what is happening now for us is happening for God, even as what will happen in the future for us is now happening for God. I'm not sure philosophically that it makes any sense to talk about things being true for God, but not through for us. But if there is any truth to that way of speaking, this amounts to saying that Jesus is at present for God, being born, crucified, rising from the dead, and coming again simultaneously for God. Which is to say we are both in our sins and forgiven for our sins simultaneously for God. Which of course is the heart of neo orthodox soteriology. It is the heart of what Karl Barth teaches about salvation, that all men are simultaneously condemned and all men are simultaneously forgiven by God. And it makes nonsense of the gospel. And so you see, what begins to sound like a profound metaphysical conviction that God is outside of time can do a great deal of mischief theologically. However, if we mean by the expression that God is outside of time, that he's outside of our experience of time, that he is the Creator and we live subject to creaturely conditions, and time is one of those conditions. If this is a way of exalting God's lordship and sovereignty over time than all well and good. What we mean, therefore, is that though there is something analogous to time in God, there is a transition from wrath to grace in history, there is in fact the reality of Jesus being born and later dying and later rising again, and yet future to us coming. If we mean that God is sovereign over every affair of history, so that time never moves too quickly or too slowly for God and his plan, then of course we are being biblical in our inferences and our theology, and that is all well and good for us. Time can be a great threat. I suppose time is a threat to me more often than not time means deadlines, getting things done, time. And we fill our lives with deadlines. We fill our lives with things that need to get done. And so we tend to curse the clock. Instead of our own scheduling and our own over involvement in things, we tend to curse the idea that time is moving on relentlessly, like a tyrant moving over us, not giving us a chance to breathe and to get the things done that we want to. For others, however, time is not a tyrant and it's not a threat. Time is really something of an albatross around the neck, if you will. Time is a bondage. Time is a great boredom with the passage of time. What we have is a lot of emptiness. And there are people languishing in hospital beds and people who are going through a great deal of physical suffering, or people who are, who know what it is to have nothing on their hands to do that, look upon time as a great burden, a bondage. And so you see how we as human beings approach the subject of time. It either moves too fast for us, in which case it's a tirade, or moves too slowly for us, in which case it's a kind of bondage. But Peter tells us that time never moves too quickly or too slowly for God because we shouldn't forget this one thing on this New Year's Day. That one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. It is to be noted here that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years. It does not say that one day is a thousand years, which would be to say that black is white and up is down, and to contradict the very meaning of the terms being used. Peter says, however, that God in one day's time can do and can experience what might take us a thousand years. And on the other hand, a thousand years are as one day. And so we learn from this that God is the Lord of time. Everything that happens, happens according to God's sovereign and wise plan. There's I trust, a well known verse to most of you in this congregation this morning in Ephesians 1:11, where Paul, speaking of the blessings of our redemption and Jesus Christ our Savior, says, in whom we were made, a heritage having been foreordained according to the purpose of him who works all things after the counsel of his will. And what I want you to note this morning is the way Paul describes God. He describes the one whom he worships as someone working all things after the counsel of his will, someone who works all things, someone who causes whatever happens to take place. God is the one who is behind every event of history. God causes whatever happens to happen. And the reason it happens and the way that it happens is because of his plan, because of his counsel, because of his will. One of the telling marks of intelligence, of rationality, Is the ability to plan. In fact, there are some books that explore the subject of reasonableness or rationality, as it's sometimes called in the human creature. And they say the mark of a person who is sane and rational over against one who is insane. Is that the sane person can plot out a plan and follow through. Knows how to get from point A to point B and all the steps in between. Now, we may not agree with the goals that every sane or rational person has. That isn't to say that planning necessarily makes you a good person. But planning makes you an intelligent person. Planning makes you a sane person. The ability to operate in terms of an overall principle or scheme. Now, what amazes me is how often people tend to look upon God as some kind of less than rational or sane being. We all operate in terms of a plan. We all plot out a course. We try to follow it. We try to move from point A to point B. What we're doing, whether it amounts to getting your coffee early in the morning. Or planning out your day's work. Or what you're going to accomplish that week. Or the goals you have for this year. Or what your life's ambition may be. We all tend to work in terms of plans. And yet so often people turn around and they think that God doesn't do that sort of thing. God, just some kind of inert force in the universe, stands back without knowing where things are going or why they're doing what they are. Without any kind of plan or purpose for history. I want to tell you, that's a very depressing doctrine. It's a doctrine which takes the meaning out of our lives. It takes the meaning out of our plans. That takes any security out of the idea that this universe is regular. And that we can plan on the basis of it. And as a matter of fact, is a crushing doctrine. When I was teaching school at Ashland Theological Seminary, I still remember one student with tears in his eyes came to me after a lecture on how God is the sovereign over history, came and said, but how can I possibly tell that to this woman in the hospital room. Who sees her child there languishing? Her child who is seriously deformed? How can I possibly go and tell her that God planned it all? What kind of God is it that would Plan some of the tragedies of history. And of course, I hope you will understand, I hope that I more consistently understand that when people ask questions like that, the first thing to give them is not some kind of cut and dry theological formula. The first thing you need to understand is the suffering that that woman's going through and why the student should be in pain over that. If there was no sense of pain about what's happening in history, there wouldn't be any theological question. There wouldn't be any difficulty to faith. And so I do know that it's a struggle. It should cause us to reflect, why does God do what he does in history? It should also move us to wonder and to submission when we do that. But those are genuine questions. And so, of course, I had to sympathize with that student in his question. But then as I went on to try to offer the theological answer that he was seeking, I said, as a matter of fact, that God is lord over history is not a difficult doctrine when you compare it to its opposite. Because though it may be difficult to go to a mother and to tell her that all of this is part of the plan of God and that God is good and intends good, and that his plan will bring glory to his name. And that's what we want above all in our lives, is to see his name glorified. That though it is difficult because of the suffering that is there, it is absolutely meaningless to go and say, I can't tell you why this would happen. God can't do anything about it. God's not in control. History is just like a runaway car and nobody knows what will ever happen. So that the suffering of that child is meaningless doesn't fit into any plan, benevolent or malevolent. Don't you see that although it's difficult to present, if you will, a theodicy, a defense of the ways of God on earth in light of him being Lord of history, it is all the more difficult, a hundred times more difficult, to tell somebody why their child is suffering. When there's no meaning to history, when there's no plan or goal, and when we're going nowhere at all, then you see, suffering truly is meaningless, pointless. God is not glorified. And we are not benefited through the experience of suffering if that is the case. And so God is Lord of time. That's the first, the first thing Peter wants us to acknowledge this morning. That, you see, history is no problem to God. History is part of his plan. It is his game plan, if you will. And God's timetable may not always be the same as our own. That's one of the great sanctifying problems of life, isn't it? That God's timetable isn't mine. And I have to learn to say, God, am I going too fast? Am I going too slow? Am I trying to lay upon you or impose upon you my priorities, my scheduling, my timetable? Or am I willing to submit to you? You know, you don't have to be a Calvinist to really understand the heart of the doctrine that I'm laying out before you. Although we tend to think this is somehow a Calvinistic doctrine, it's not. It's a Christian doctrine doctrine. It's a biblical doctrine. And though a lot of people, I think, get a little messed up in the way they express their theology when it comes to this, all genuine believers believe this. I think of Jim Elliot, who was not renowned as a theologian, certainly not renowned as some reformed or Calvinistic theologian. You know, Jim Elliot the missionary, went down to the Auca Indians, one of the first to make contact with them, who flew in there with two of his friends on that fateful day when they were to make contact for the first time with these Indians in South America. And they were killed, martyred by these Indians, a tribe that was later converted. In fact, the very murderer of Jim Elliot was converted later and lived to give confession of faith to Jesus Christ. It's an amazing story. All the more amazing is what Eliot wrote in his diary before he went, as he wrote the words that perhaps you've heard in many other contexts, but this is the life setting out of which they come. Eliot wrote, I may not know what the future holds, but I know who holds the future. And so we could go again. Theologically, he may not have expressed it correctly, but, you know, in his life he knew what we were talking about. God is Lord of history. God holds history in his hand and God determines the end from the beginning. And for God, history is never too slow. History is never too fast, for God is the sovereign. And so if God is the Lord of history, how should we live? Peter says, beware. I'm going to give you a very big word here now. Beware of uniformitarianism. Uniformitarianism. What does he mean by that? Well, it's very, very easy to understand uniformitarianism if you just look at your Bibles in Second Peter, chapter three, where Peter describes the mockery of those who come walking after their own desires. In verse four, he says, they say, where's the promise of his coming? For from the day that the fathers fell asleep. Everything continues as it was from the beginning of creation. Everything is happening according to a uniform plan. There are no big gaps in history, no dramatic changes. Everything's just the way it's always been. Everything is operating uniformly. Everything continues as it was from the beginning, without sudden intrusions, without dramatic breaks, without changes in the pattern. Everything's just the way it always has been. And you know, those who believe that, those who believe we don't have to worry about the coming of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Those who say God obviously has forgotten about that or never meant business about it in the first place. Those who say this couldn't be true because after all, we have years and years and years of uniform human history behind us. Peter says, are wrong. They forget, first of all, the experience of the flood. Can you imagine what it was like for Noah? One of these days we have to do a study of the life of Noah to give you a greater appreciation. Noah preached for years, not 10 and not 15 or 20. He preached for 40 years, repentance. And you know how many people he had come down the aisle at his altar call? None. The only people who put up with the ridiculous preaching of Noah were his own family members. And my guess is they probably had a lot of doubts about about him. But family loyalty kept them going. But for the sake of Noah, God delayed the flood. And for the building of the ark, God delayed the flood. But then the day came when out in the middle of the desert, raindrops were falling on people's faces. They said, no, no, it couldn't have been right. And then, you see, it wasn't just nice little raindrops. It became a torrential downfall. And at that point, they began to wonder if perhaps they should have listened to Noah and they wanted to go and ask him some questions. Is this what you had in mind? Noah? But you see, he was unavailable, locked away as he was in the ark. And then the day came when there was no high ground left to flee to and people drowned. Peter says, don't forget that. Mockers forget that people who have a history, a philosophy of history that says nothing ever changes, really, everything is uniform. They forget the preaching of Noah and the fact that this earth was once destroyed by a flood. And the very same word of God that told Noah that the earth would be destroyed by flood, that same word of God is now preserving the earth for fiery judgment in the future. Where God once destroyed the earth by water, he will now destroy it by fire. And the Lord has an alternative reason for this delay, not because he's forgotten his promise, but v. 9, says, the Lord's not slack concerning his promise as some count slackness, but rather is longsuffering to you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. God, you see, delays the destruction of the world and the day of final judgment so that every one of his people might be saved. God delays the day of judgment so that none of the elect, none of the church, none of those who have been chosen from all eternity belong to our Savior, would be lost. God is long suffering so that men will have time to repent, to change their ways and their attitudes and their thoughts. But Peter tells us that that very same promise, about which God is not slack, also ensures that the delay we're talking about will not be forever. Look at verse 13. But according to his promise, we look for new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. The day is coming when God will say enough. Where God will say, that is the end history. And a new heavens and a new earth will be ushered in. And so don't forget the experience of the flood. That very same word of God that brought the flood will bring fiery judgment in the future. Don't think that the Lord's forgotten His promise. It's just because of his promise that he's delaying that final day of judgment. And that final day of judgment will come, because that's the only way in which God can ensure that the new heavens and the new earth by his promise will be given to us. And verse 10 tells us, and therefore the day of the Lord is going to be for many people, a complete surprise. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the element shall be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are therein shall be burned up. Because men think that everything happens uniformly, nothing ever changes, no dramatic breaks or intrusions in history, because they think that way. When Jesus does return, it's going to be as though a thief were breaking into their house, completely unexpected. How many of you know when the thief's going to break into your home? Well, if you knew, he wouldn't be a very good thief, would he? How many of us have said, oh, it can't happen here, not to us. Somebody wouldn't break into our house. Yet it happens. And when it happens, the success of that happening depends upon surprise, unexpectedness. And Peter warns the mockers of his day and the mockers of Every day up until the day of the Lord, he warns them that Jesus will be like a thief to them. Coming suddenly and unexpectedly, by complete surprise is the Lord of time. And if we have been warned properly against this idea that we think, well, history will just go on and on and on. We don't have to worry about any great intrusions or breaks in the pattern. It seems to me there are at least four practical implications in this passage that have to be taken into account. And the first is this. In verses 9 and 10, the Lord's not slack concerning his promise, but longsuffering, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief. What does that mean? That means that God is delaying for the sake of repentance. Is it possible that there are individuals here in this room, in this auditorium, as I'm now preaching, that are not ready for the day of the Lord? Is it possible that you have not ever turned to God and said, I'm sorry, I have offended your holy character? My life is not what it ought to be. My life is selfish, it is idolatrous. It is disobedient, polluted and wrong. And I need to be turned around. I need to change my life's direction. I need to change my attitudes. I need to change the course of my life. I need to stop depending upon myself and to throw myself on the grace and mercy of God. I need Jesus Christ to be my Lord and Savior. Peter says, don't begin this new year without having repented. That's the reason God is delaying the final day of judgment. And so have you repented, you say? Well, I know the doctrine of repentance. I know the doctrine of the saving mercy of Jesus Christ. I know the doctrine of salvation as it's taught in the Christian church. Do you know it if you haven't repented? If you have not cast yourself upon the mercy of the Savior? Oh, you know it, but in a damning way. Does that surprise you? It should surprise you. Does it shock you? It should frighten you that there are people who know the way of salvation and it will damn them on the final day because knowing it, they have not done what God calls them to do. He calls upon all men everywhere to repent, to turn, to change, to give up their sinful ways, their self centered ways, and to start living in a way that pleases God. And the only thing that pleases God is abject subservience to Him. If that bothers you, if that somehow rankles you, if it seems wrong that the Lord of history should require you to bow at his throne and depend entirely upon him, well, then of course we make our choices. We pay our money and we take the price, don't we? But if it seems appropriate to you that the one who is the author of our life and the source of our sustenance, if the one who gives us by his mercy, sunshine and crops day by day, if the one who allows us to enjoy the pleasures of culture and intellectual, in comfortable living in loving families and all the other good things that are common blessings in this world, if it somehow seems wrong to you that that author of every good thing in this world should require you to say thank you and to throw yourself upon his mercy for your salvation, if that seems appropriate to you, then I must plead with you not to let one day of 1984 go without making things right with God. The first practical implication of Peter's teaching is that we need to repent. And secondly, Peter says you need to abandon ultimate hope in anything but Christ. In verses 12 and 13, we read looking for and earnestly desiring the coming of the day of God by reason of which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved and the elements shall melt with fervent heat. But according to this promise, we look for a new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. What is it that you can hope in in this world? Your riches, financial security, it's all going to be dissolved with fervent heat. What is it that you're going to depend upon in this world? Some kind of military security. It's going to dissolve in fervent heat. What is it that you're relying on in this world for all eternity? Well, if it's anything in this world and pertaining to this world, it's going to be gone. Peter says you can't trust your books, you can't trust your family relations, you can't trust your wealth, you can't trust anything except the God who was coming to judge in that day. You need to repent and you need to put your hope in Jesus Christ, in Him alone. For on that day, there will be no other options. Now, I recognize the embarrassment of doing that in this day and age. It seems so unnecessary. I mean, people are getting along just fine, aren't they? 1984 is a year of hope for so many people. Things are going to go along really well. The economic circumstances seem to be looking up. I mean, we still have military peace and security in our land. There Seems to be so many things we can be happy about. Why believe that? We have to put our hope in something beyond our present experience. Why should we have to hope in God, in Christ? Why should we worry about these things? But you see, you need to be able to think, what's it going to be like on the day of judgment, when all those things around you are gone and when everything that you now count as regular, secure, trustworthy and reliable is not there to lean upon in that day? There's only one thing that you can count upon. There's only one anchor for your soul then, and that'll be Jesus Christ, your judge. But if you haven't trusted him until that day, he will not be your savior. He will be your judge. On that day, the heavens and earth will pass away, and he'll usher in a new heavens and earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. I counsel you to become a citizen of that world, a citizen of that kingdom. Now you can hope in nothing else. Peter says in verse 11 that thirdly, we must have our priorities changed, seeing that those things are thus all to be dissolved. What manner of persons ought ye to be in all holy living and godliness? You know what the problem is with a uniformitarian understanding of history? The idea that everything goes on just as it has from the very beginning. There are no dramatic changes, no intrusions, no break in history, if you will. The problem with uniformitarian thinking is we always think we have more time. We can always get it right later. I realized in 1983 I didn't reach my goals. Those resolutions I made one year ago this very day, I didn't realize any of them. That's okay. I've got another year. And if I don't get it this year, I'll have another year and another year and another year. I don't have to reform my life. I don't have to change my priorities. I. I don't have to get things worked out. Because time goes on and on, doesn't it? And Peter says, no, it doesn't. Seeing that these things are going to be dissolved, what manner of people should you be? What kind of people should you be? You should be the kind of people who reform themselves, who change their priorities, who have a scale of values that they're willing to see jumbled up. A scale of values that is common, contrary to the culture round about us. A scale of values that doesn't seem to have any impending importance. And in verse 14, he says finally that we should be ready to meet the Lord at any time. Therefore, Beloved, seeing that you look for these things, give diligence that you may be found in peace, without spot and blameless in his sight. I remember when I was growing up as an evangelical Christian that I would hear from time to time sermons that emphasize that idea, that would ask the question, what if Jesus were to come right now? How would you feel if Jesus found you doing what you are doing? Would you want to meet Jesus immediately? And I suppose I get a little tired of hearing that kind of emphasis, which is really a sad reflection on my spiritual condition, isn't it? Because that's exactly what Peter says here. He says, you want to be found spotless. Be diligent that you will be diligent that when the Lord returns, you'll welcome him. Not as a thief, saying, oh, I'm not ready. Come back later when I've prepared for you, but rather one who can welcome him. Because, as Paul says, you're not in darkness, brothers, that he should come upon you as a thief. There are two critical errors I need to warn you about before we close this morning when it comes to the temptations of time. Two dangerous mistakes. We find them recorded very conveniently in Matthew 24:25. And I'm going to close by looking at this text. Matthew 24 at the 45th verse. Hear Jesus when he says, who then is the faithful and wise servant whom his Lord hath set over his household to give them their food in due season? Blessed is that servant whom his Lord, when he comes, shall find so doing. Verily I say unto you, that he will set him over all that he hath. But if that evil servant shall say in his heart, my lord, tarrieth, and shall begin to beat his fellow servants, and shall eat and drink with the drunken, the Lord of that servant shall come in a day when he expecteth not, in an hour when he knoweth not, and shall cut him asunder and appoint his portion with the hypocrites, there shall be the weeping and the gnashing of teeth. And then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto 10 virgins who took their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom. And five of them were foolish, and five were wise. For the foolish, when they took their lamps, took no oil with them. But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. Now while the bridegroom carrieth, they all slumbered and slept. But at midnight there is a cry, behold the bridegroom. Come ye forth to meet him. Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps, and the foolish said, Unto the wise, give us of your oil, for our lamps are going out. But the wise answered, saying, peradventure, there shall not be enough for us. And you go ye rather to them that sell and buy for yourselves. And while they were away to buy, the bridegroom came, and they that were ready went in with him to the marriage feast, and the door was shut. Afterward came also the other virgin, saying, lord, Lord, open to us. But he answered and said, verily I say unto you, I don't know you. Therefore watch, for you know not the day nor the hour. Jesus tells two stories. They're exactly opposite. From what they're getting at, this may surprise you. Notice that in the first story, Matthew 24:48 tells us he deals with an Ur and an evil servant who says, my Lord tarries. The idea here is, my Lord's not going to come back for a long time. I can get away with whatever I want. I can get away with murder. He starts beating the other servants. He starts living in riot. He starts drinking and becoming a drunkard. And because he figured his Lord's going to be away for a long time, that servant is utterly surprised when the Lord suddenly appears and cuts him asunder. Jesus had a way with words, didn't he? Jesus says that the Lord doesn't come back and say, you've made something of a theological mistake here. No, he cuts him off completely and appoints his place with the hypocrites, where there is the weeping and the gnashing of teeth. He sends him to hell because he wasn't prepared for his coming. And so we might think, well, then I guess we'd better live in this kind of excited, agitated state that we find in so many churches in Orange county where Jesus is going to come any minute. We've almost got it timed. In fact, one of the pastors, one of the largest fellowships in this area, has a well known New Year's Eve service. Many of us have tapes of that in which he says, the Lord will come. In this particular year, the Lord didn't. Jesus tells another story. Then he says, on the other hand, don't be like the foolish virgins who, because they thought they knew when the bridegroom would appear for the feast, went ahead and used all their oil and didn't make any preparation for a long wait. He says, they are foolish virgins. And again, the outcome of the story is not, well, we need to clean up your theology. You need to be able to answer these questions on paper a little bit better. No? When the foolish virgins finally come to their senses. You notice the door is shut. And when they say, lord, let us in, he says, I don't know who you are. I don't recognize you. You don't belong to me. My friends, these are dire words. These are not words about some kind of intramural eschatological debate among Christians. These are words that have to do with whether our hearts are right with God and whether we are ready to meet Him. Two different problems. One, thinking the Lord's going to tarry, take a long time coming back. The other problem, thinking the Lord's going to come immediately. Well, what's the alternative? You know the laws of logic, this law of excluded mental right. I mean, either is going to tarry or he's not going to tarry. What's it going to be? In both cases, Jesus teaches the same thing. He says, you live your life obediently, day by day. You be ready. So if the Lord tarries, you just plug right along. And if the Lord comes immediately, you're going to be found doing the things you're supposed to do. For you see, in Matthew 24:44, we find the text, we find the theme, the rubric under which these two stories are told. Therefore, you also be ready. For in an hour that you think not the Son of Man comes. Be ready. Being ready doesn't mean with face, looking up to the heavens, doing nothing. Down here, being ready means doing what servants are told to do. Preparing for the feast as the virgins were supposed to, doing everything God tells us to do, regularly, obediently, reliably, moment by moment. Is that what 1984 is going to be like for you? Are you going to put off till next week reforming your lifestyle? You're going to put off to next week reading your Bible every day? Put off to next week repenting for your lustful thoughts or for your envy at your neighbor's good fortune. Put off to next week getting to church regularly, on time to Bible study, praying, calling on those who are in need. Put off to next week. Living the Christian life. Two critical errors. The temptations of time. To think that time's going so fast that I can't get anything done, so why try? Or that it's going so slow that why worry about it? There's always another opportunity. I want you to remember that God is the Lord of time. He's not slack according to his promise. Uniformitarianism is something to be very, very cautious about. The idea that God is going to return this very night is something to be very cautious about. You have only one alternative then, in 1984, and the only New Year's resolution that I'm hoping that you you'll make, and that's that you're going to repent right now. And from this moment on lead a Christian life that is worthy of the name Christian. 1984. I trust that you'll find what it means that God holds the future in his hand. Let's pray. Father, we ask that you might awaken our hearts, that we would be aware of the true dangers as we humanly think about the passage of time, the danger that we might think that yout too are subject to it and its tyranny and bondage, even as we are. Lord, we're happy to confess this morning that yout are all glorious, majestic and sovereign, that you are above these sorts of things and that you do not suffer as we do as creatures in the face of time and its passage. And thus we look to your sure word. And we rely upon you and your grace to bring us through 1984 and through the passage of another year. We ask that we might truly be on our toes. We might be alert to the dangers of thinking that we have plenty of time to get things right with you, to change our lives, to adjust our priorities, to repent and to rely upon Jesus Christ. Lord, we ask that you might this very moment change our hearts if we have been thus sluggish. Lord, we pray also that we might not be so frazzled as to think that there's no time left, that time is moving so quickly that we can't do what you've asked us to do. Do that we need to expend our oil and just hope that there's enough to get us through. Lord, we ask rather you would help us to make provisions for the future, to make wise plans that we might plug along day by day, faithful and obedient, knowing that in so doing your coming will not be as a thief to us. Father, we do pray that you would awaken us to the temptations of the time. Help us to rely upon you and to make use of time. Indeed, Lord, help us to redeem the time in light of our evil days. For it's in Jesus name that we pray. Amen.