Advertise on podcast: Sermons from Grace City Church Hawaii

Judgment Day is the climactic point of human history when God executes his righteous justice over the whole earth. It’s the day when justice is served, and payback and amends are made for every wrong. For those in Christ, this won’t be a day of horror, it will be a day of rejoicing as we gain our reward of eternal life. Today’s sermon unpacks the role our good works have at Judgment Day, and we wrestle with the tension of a loving God “sending” people to eternal fire and punishment.

Jesus continues to teach what life looks like as we await his return. How do we stay alert and ready for his return when his return seems delayed and it seems like it’s taking forever?

The “last days” began with the first coming of Jesus. From the time of Jesus’s ascension to the closing of the New Testament canon, the apostles believed Jesus’s return would be “soon”. Now it’s been about two thousand years since, and the world has not passed away. As a result, many of us struggle to feel the urgency to live as the apostles instructed. How do we live in the last days that have lasted so long and may last for generations longer?

Jesus makes it clear that we don’t know the day or the hour of his Second Coming. However, we do know his return will be sudden, it will be obvious, and many will be caught unaware. Rather than speculate about the timing of his return, we are told to be alert and to be ready for that day.

Jesus’ prophetic prediction of the Temple’s destruction, the fall of Jerusalem, and the end of the world isn’t meant to cause fear or confusion. Rather, Jesus’ followers are told to stand firm, to be ready, and to find comfort that God is in control of all things.

Sometimes to learn what to do we need to learn what not to do. Today’s text is like that – it gives us a negative image, which should help us understand the positive image. This chapter tells us what life in the kingdom doesn’t look like, thereby, we learn what life in the kingdom does look like.

The resurrection that’s coming is more than a far off time and place. The resurrection bears down on our lives and determines how we live our lives today as new creations.

Jesus continues to teach about the importance of a fruitful life with a crazy story about inheritance-stealing, murder, and redemption.

Deep down, biblical fruitfulness is what we all strive for in this life. By killing the fig tree Jesus is demonstrating how serious he is about the fruitfulness of his people. Jesus also teaches the key to a fruitful life.

Jesus’ entrance into Jerusalem is his first public proclamation that he is the Messiah. After the celebration dies down, Jesus exerts his authority as the King by confronting the money changers in the Temple. So what do we do with Jesus’ authority? Do we submit to it, or do we ignore it? Is partial submission good enough? Is it worthwhile to keep re-submitting, and re-committing ourselves? The sermon unpacks what Jesus does with part-time submitters.