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Advent HOPE Sabbath School

Alistair Huong

It Is Finished

Father in heaven, I thank you so much for this time that we can spend in study together this Sabbath morning.

Your goodness and your mercy and your grace abounds, and we are so grateful for the type of God you are.

And today, Lord, I pray you will help us to see you in a clearer light and also to help us understand our place in the great controversy.

May your Holy Spirit be here as our guide and lead us, Lord, into all truth.

Where do we find these words in scripture who said these words Jesus and when did Jesus say these words I guess I kind of gave it away with the picture on the slide, right?

Well, let's take a look where it's found in scripture.

John 19, verse 30, When Jesus therefore had received the vinegar, He said, It is finished.

And he bowed his head and gave up the ghost.

Jesus with his expiring breath on the cross declared it is finished and it's fitting because Did Jesus fail in any particular in His mission on the earth?

Was He a unblemished sacrifice for our redemption?

Did he fulfill every prophecy about him and his work in the Old Testament?

In fact, right here, the very fact that he had to receive the vinegar, the sour wine, it was prophesied in scripture.

And he realized after that act, every particular about his life had been fulfilled.

If it was finished, and the plan of salvation was finished, and the plan of redemption was finished, and what Christ was sent to do was completed, Why hasn't He come yet?

If the work of Christ was complete in the fullest sense on the cross, then why has there been 2, 000 years of history since then?

And if you are even mildly familiar with world history, you know that the last 2, 000 years have not been particularly kind.

We had just the 20th century alone, world wars, holocausts, horrible diseases that previously did not exist, millions sent to an early grave, innocent lives lost.

Yet, if Christ's work was completed, then what was the purpose for history continuing on?

Well, we're going to try to answer this question, but before we go there, we have to realize something else, okay?

And that is, on the cross, that wasn't the only time that God said, it is finished.

It's actually found several other times in scripture, 3 times altogether in, to be more specific, and the other 2 times, it's found in the book of Revelation.

Revelation chapter 16 verse 17 says this, And the seventh angel poured out his vial into the air, and there came a great voice out of the temple of heaven from the throne, saying, It is done.

Not exactly the same words, but the same idea.

Something was completed in Revelation 16, verse 7.

And how do we know that this is God speaking?

The great voice that comes out of the temple of God from the throne.

There's only 1 person that sits on the throne in the heavenly sanctuary, and that is God.

Revelation chapter 16, it tells us, at the time when the seventh angel pours out His vial into the air.

It is none other than the seventh plague.

And so put it in other words, right at the close of time, after the 7 last plagues, or I should say at the seventh plague 1 is being poured out which happens to be right before the second coming of Jesus out of the temple in heaven God declares again it is done that's the second time Revelation chapter 21 And how many chapters are there in the book of Revelation?

So we're right at the end of the book of Revelation and this is after the millennium, after the earth made new, after the wicked are destroyed, this is the third and final time we see in scripture where God says, it is done.

I am alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, meaning this was Jesus himself who said these words.

Why did God say, it is finished, it is done, it is done 3 separate times?

What does this have to do with Christ's work and his ministry and his death on the cross?

Well, to understand this, we need to rewind, and we need to take a broad view of a review, I should say, of the great controversy.

Because we exist in the midst of a cosmic conflict, a great war between invisible forces of great power and magnitude.

Revelation chapter 12, we see that there was war in heaven.

The dragon and his angels fought against Michael and his angels, but this was not a war of physical mastery.

We're not talking about a nuclear exchange here.

It was a war of ideas, a war of propaganda.

And what were the essential arguments and accusations leveled against each party?

Well, most important of all, foundationally, the great controversy was fought over who God is, His character.

Or is he an arbitrary God, capricious in his ways, self-serving and just wanting to get his way and have his creatures bow down to him no matter what he says or does.

Well that's exactly what Satan said about God.

God is only out for his own best interest.

And Satan then made all of these accusations and in return he says, well, I should have authority.

I then should be granted rulership in the universe.

Satan, that covering cherub who stood closest to God, who understood the inner workings of the Godhead the best, made all of these accusations about God and said...

God says Satan is the liar, but Satan says God is the liar.

But there is a distinct end point here that God is trying to arrive at in the great controversy, and that is he is trying to achieve an eternal basis of security.

He doesn't want affliction to rise a second time.

God has to be very careful in how he conducts his business, how he prosecutes his case.

And then another element in the great controversy that is kind of a monkey wrench that throws sand in the gears, so to say, is this pesky little thing called the freedom of choice.

God created us as free moral agents able to make up our own minds.

And the very fact that there is sin in a universe created by a perfect God, I believe, is 1 of the greatest evidences that the freedom of choice exists.

Because if God is perfect and omniscient and all-powerful, if He created us to sin, He created defective creatures.

But if He created us with the capacity to choose non-compliance, to choose to divert from the ideal, That's just evidence that God created us with a power that even he himself will not usurp.

With all of these elements in view, we realize then that the great controversy has to be prosecuted.

The war has to be fought in a very careful manner.

But before we go on, you must be thinking, now this is all nice and good, but did you just make all this up?

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It Is Finished

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