Most Christians think they’re safe just because their names are on a church roll… but the Bible says a SHAKING is coming that will reveal who truly belongs to Christ. Before Jesus returns, the church itself will be shaken to the core — the worldly, the superficial, the proud, and the compromising will be shaken OUT, and only the remnant will remain. Join Pastor Mark Finley for this Bible presentation.

<p>Most Christians think they’re safe just because their names are on a church roll… but the Bible says a SHAKING is coming that will reveal who truly belongs to Christ. Before Jesus returns, the church itself will be shaken to the core — the worldly, the superficial, the proud, and the compromising will be shaken OUT, and only the remnant will remain. Join Pastor Mark Finley for this Bible presentation.</p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

HopeLives365

Mark Finley

Why Most Church Members Won’t Make It Through the Shaking

Have you ever heard somebody say, before Jesus comes, there's going to be a real shaking in the church?

And you've wondered, what does that mean, there's going to be a shaking in the church?

And what events will take place before the coming of Jesus that caused this shaking?

Stay with us and you'll have answers to those questions.

The great hope of every Christian is the second coming of Jesus Christ.

Soon, war and worry and want will be over.

Soon pestilence and poverty will be over.

Soon sickness and suffering will be over.

And soon Jesus will come and we'll be caught up to meet him with our dead loved ones who've loved Christ, resurrected, will be caught up to meet Jesus in the sky.

1, 500 times the Bible mentions the second coming of Christ.

For every prophecy on the first coming of Christ in the Old Testament, there are 8 on the second coming of Jesus.

The second coming of Jesus is 1 of the mountain peaks of scripture.

But yet, before Jesus comes again, there are events that will take place in this world.

In the book called Seventh Volume of the Testimonies, page 14, where it says, "'Those who place themselves under God's control "'to be led and guided by His will "'catch the steady tread of the events "'ordained by Him to take place.'" Did you notice that?

These events will lead up to the final proclamation of the gospel in the world.

You know, 1 of the great hopes is not the coming disaster.

1 of the great hopes is not the coming persecution of God's people.

1 of the great hopes is not the coming time of trouble.

1 of the great hopes is when God's people, filled with His Holy Spirit, proclaim to the ends of the earth, His glory.

There are a number of Bible passages that speak about the proclamation of the gospel in the last days.

We'll choose 1 just in the Old Testament, 1 in the New Testament.

The earth will be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.

The earth is going to be filled with the knowledge of the glory of God.

And then in Revelation chapter 18, we see the climax of the proclamation of the gospel.

We find it here in Revelation 18.1, and these things, After these things, I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority." Some translations, the King James, for example, says great power.

And the earth was illuminated with his glory.

So 1 day, God's people, filled with the Holy Spirit, will go out to proclaim the message of his love and grace and goodness to the world.

But before that comes, there will be a shaking among God's people.

Before that comes, God will purify his church.

And this is what I want to talk to you about today, the coming shaking of God's people.

You see, Revelation has 2 major objectives.

1 is to reveal the plans of God, and the other is to unmask the plans of Satan.

Now, throughout history, God has purified his church by calling out a faithful few.

He called out Abraham from idolatry and led Abraham to be the father of a nation that would bless the world.

God's plan for Israel, that Israel would be a light to the Gentiles and bless the world.

But when Israel drifted from God, they lost their sense of purpose and God had to call out from Israel, the New Testament Christian Church.

And then, as the New Testament Christian Church in those early centuries apostatized, as it linked hands with the world, particularly in the third and fourth centuries when Constantine, the pagan Roman emperor, became a Christian, church and state united.

We go into the period called the Middle or Dark Ages, God called out in the Reformation, the Protestant movement with the Waldensies, pre-Protestant, and then you had people like Martin Luther, great man of God, but certainly didn't understand all of God's truth.

And God called out a Protestant movement from the larger body.

But as that Protestant movement did not keep moving ahead, faithfully observing the commandments of God, as they did not follow the totality of Scripture.

So the question is, will God call out another movement from the Advent movement.

The word ekklesia, which is translated church in the New Testament, ek means out of, klesia is calling.

So the church was a called out body, but God has another plan for his church, he has another plan for his people.

There will not be a calling out, but rather there will be a shaking out, and that's what we're gonna study.

And how can we keep from being shaken out?

We're gonna go back and pick up verse 25.

See that you do not refuse him who speaks, for if they did not escape, who refused him who spoke on earth, much more shall we not escape if we turn away from him who speaks from heaven, whose voice then shook the earth, but now he has promised saying, yet once more I shake, not only the earth, but also heaven.

Now this, yet once more indicates the removal of the things that are shaken as of things that are made that the things which cannot be shaken may remain.

Now notice here God says that those who are shaken will be shaken out.

It's the removal of those things that are shaken and those who cannot be shaken they do what?

So we're not interested in any offshoot because they shoot off, they do not remain.

Here, Scripture tells us that although in the past method, God purified his church by a calling out, a calling out of a distinct body of believers.

But in the last days, he used a different method.

We find this idea of the shaking throughout scripture.

Notice, you shall winnow them and the wind shall carry them away and the whirlwind shall scatter them.

You shall rejoice in the Lord and the glory and the Holy 1 of Israel.

So God would purify as wind scattered away the chaff and separated it from the wheat.

So that is God's method of purifying his church.

We go to Matthew 3 and verse 12 Matthew 3 and verse 12 and we notice here in Matthew 3 verse 12 the scripture puts it this way his winnowing fan in it fan is in his hand and he will strongly purge his threshing floor.

And then it says, and gather his wheat into his barn but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire." So God gathers his wheat, the remnant.

Ellen White makes a fascinating statement in the second, In Second Selected Messages, Volume 2, page 380, she says, the church may appear as about to fall.

Sometimes, do you look at the church, the corporate church, and you see worldliness coming in, you see compromise coming in, you see lack of commitment to God's Word and a complacency toward witness and you look at it you say the church appears about to fall.

The church may appear as about to fall but it does not fall.

Well if it remains how does God purify his church?

The sinners in Zion will be sifted out, the chaff separated from the precious wheat.

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Why Most Church Members Won’t Make It Through the Shaking

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