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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Siegfried Roeske

How Soon is Soon?

Wow, that's my sermon It's a privilege to be at Advent Hope you are my people This is how I was how I grew up This is how we worshipped and this how we studied the Bible when I was a child, and I've tried to do it all my life.

When our oldest boy, who's now 50, was 3 years old, 1 evening he had a hard time going to sleep.

And I walked to his room, his eyes wide open, and said, Reiner, You're not sleeping.

And he looked up to me and said, Daddy, how much longer is the night?

I said, well, I tell you what, You close your eyes and go to sleep and the night will be over.

Matthew 24, I like to read our basic text and I would like to talk about it.

Verses 1 to 3, a few more verses up to 8.

Jesus went out and departed from the temple.

Disciples came to him to show him the buildings of the temple.

And Jesus said to them, seeing all these things, verily I say unto you, there shall not be left 1 stone upon another that shall not be thrown down.

And then as they walked up to Mount of Olivet, Jesus left the temple for the last time.

As he sat on the mountain of Olives, the disciples came to him privately, saying, Tell us, when shall these things be?

And what shall be the sign of their coming in the end of the world?

That's the cry of suffering humanity this morning Daddy, how much longer is the night and Is it appropriate to ask that question?

Disciples asking, Jesus, should it be OK for us to ask the same question?

What is the sign of your coming in the end of the world?

Then Jesus answered in an interesting way by saying, take heed that no man deceive you.

Many shall come in my name saying I'm Christ shall deceive many.

You shall hear wars, rumors of wars, see that you not be troubled.

For all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.

Nation shall rise against nation, kingdom against kingdom, there shall be famines, pestilences, earthquakes in diverse places.

All these are the beginning of the end, the beginning of sorrows.

And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for witness unto all nations and then the end shall come.

Yesterday, a student in class asked, Eldorowski, with the events of this week, do you think we're living in the last days?

I want to tell you that I had not experienced a week right like this 1 in my life.

And I thought to myself, If this is not the end, it'll be a foretaste.

The wrath, the anger, and the evil that has sweeped the streets someday will be turned against you and me.

And I think definitely this is a sign of the coming of the Lord.

You know, it was Peter or Paul who said, we are closer to the end than we were before.

And yet some people are backing away from the idea of soonness.

At a time when it's sooner than it has ever been in our lives.

And here's an interesting trick about these signs.

I've heard a young theologian say 1 time, well, he was actually a colleague of mine some years back, oh, well, these signs have always existed.

I mean, wars, rumors of wars, Old Testament filled with wars.

Then I start to think, I said, yeah, maybe that's true.

The First World War was just outside of the Garden of Eden.

Cain, Sloab, 25% of the world's population was destroyed during that war.

It's nice to be able to agree with people a little bit and then come around with a curve.

Yeah, well, I guess we didn't have seismographs 200 years ago.

You know, maybe back then we thought it was the horses running by the road and actually it was an earthquake, you know.

And the difficulties of life, Pestilences, sickness, disease.

On the basis of signs, the signs of the times, the apostles and disciples thought Jesus was coming in their lifetime.

And some people use that kind of as doing away with the idea of signs.

Then, of course, through the ages, and we come to 1844, you know, our pioneers expected Jesus to come in their lifetime on the basis of signs and prophecy.

If there were questions, your parents, grandparents, and certainly my parents, now they're gone too.

They believe that Jesus would come in their lifetime on the basis of science.

Therefore, my dear friend, Thelonious says, don't worry about the science.

It just didn't sound right to me when I was sitting there taking this in.

You know, sometimes the Spirit of the Lord tells you, hey this doesn't sound right.

I think the Lord helped me, the Bible helped me too.

To have a different perspective on the signs.

My question is, were all these people mistaken?

What is the meaning of signs and then number 2, what is the nature of soon?

Now In Matthew 24, and I didn't read the whole chapter, you know, I did read it at home, but I didn't read it here.

You probably know most of the details of that chapter.

See if there's a logic, a spiritual logic in this.

The first 1 has to do with the end of all things.

The end of this world and Jesus breaking through the clouds.

But then I want to spend a little more time on the signs that point to the end of my world and yours, which are an act of mercy on the part of God.

Now, the end of all things, what are some of the signs that we can look at?

Well, the greatest of them is the gospel to all the world, right?

Elder Falkenberg, Sr., you know, I got quite well acquainted with him on the Share Him program.

I took students from Union College to Zimbabwe, Africa, several times, and we really learned to appreciate Elder Falkenberg and the gospel into all the world.

The 3 weeks we were there, by God's grace, the students were there, by God's grace alone and the work that the people had done before we got there, Almost 3, 000 people were baptized by the students.

Well, we had Pentecost there because there were other students there from other colleges.

It was over 3, 000, 4, 000 people who were baptized in 1 day by God's grace.

That's probably the greatest of all the signs, but I like to read in Daniel chapter 12 And at that time shall Michael stand up the great prince which stands for the children of the people and there shall be a time Of trouble such as never was and so on and then I come to verse Yeah, okay I'll go on The children of their people and there shall be a time of trouble such as never was since there was a nation, even under the same time.

And at that time the people shall be delivered, everyone found written in the book.

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How Soon is Soon?

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