The Judgment of the Nations

Let's pray together Father, we thank you for tonight What a joy we have in serving Jesus Lord, you are so good And we know, Father, that your grace abounds beyond measure Your mercy is overwhelming And Lord, you have taught us in your word about how it is you bestow grace upon the repentant sinner And yet we also know that one day you're going to come and judge all those who refuse to receive the grace that's been offered to them And so tonight as we study that, Lord, I pray that our hearts and minds would be open to the truth, that we would learn from what you have to say to us this evening

In Jesus' name, amen If I was to ask you a question such as this, how would someone know that you truly love them? How would you respond to that? If you could do one thing, only one thing, what would be the one thing you would do to prove your love for that one individual? Think about that for a second. I think that we would have a variety of answers if asked We write down all kinds of things But I think that the Bible explains to us what needs to happen to demonstrate the depth of our love, the commitment we have to someone else, unlike anything else And let me help you explain what that is

Paul was soon to die He was in the Mamertine prison in Rome He would write his last epistle, the book of 2 Timothy, to his young protege, Timothy He would say these words, chapter 4, verse number 1, I solemnly charge you in the presence of God and of Christ Jesus, who is to judge the living and the dead, and by his appearing in his kingdom, preach the word Timothy, the king is coming The king who is going to appear is going to judge the world You need to tell them that Preach the word He would go on to say you preach that word in season and out of season

In other words, when it's convenient and when it's not convenient, because most times it's not convenient The most remarkable thing about our Lord is that he would spend more time talking about hell than he ever did heaven, for the one simple reason He didn't want people to go there He spoke more on judgment than any other topic, because he knew he was coming as judge Our Lord loved man, for God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that whosoever believes in him should not perish, but have everlasting life God sent his son so man wouldn't perish

He loved us so much he sent his son. I would venture to say that the number one priority in your life that would demonstrate your love for your husband or for your wife, your son or your daughter, your friend, your neighbor, would bet would be that you warn them of impending judgment Listen daily If you love somebody, do you not want to warn them of the dangers that will befall them? If you really love someone, would you not look them in the eye and say, listen to me, it is coming God's judgment upon the ungodly is coming

You need to make sure that you are ready to meet the king when he arrives, because when it's all said and done, listen carefully, when it's all said and done and it's all over, they will stand all by themselves before the king and that king will judge them

And wouldn't it be an awful thing for you to come in Revelation 19 on a white horse and stand in that valley called the valley of Jehoshaphat, because you will, with the king as he sits on his throne and judges the Gentile nations and your son or your daughter who did not receive the gospel while you were on earth, would stand before the king at the throne of David in Jerusalem and he say to them, depart from me, you who practice lawlessness. I wonder what kind of emotion will go through the hearts and minds of those raptured saints when they return and they see the judgment of God

And some of them are bound to see that judgment upon their family members If you love them, you will tell them Because if Jesus didn't love us, guess what? He wouldn't have said anything about judgment People say, well, you know, in the New Testament, God's the God of love In the Old Testament, he was the God of law and judgment But in the New Testament, he's love, grace and mercy Oh, no In the New Testament, he's a God who warned of impending judgment over and over and over again, over again In fact, you know this Just let me remind you of it

The very first prophecy to man, from man, about God was a prophecy of impending judgment It wasn't about, yeah, you know, God, he loves you, cares for you He wants you to be one of his No, it's, it's these words And about these also, Enoch, in the seventh generation from Adam, prophesied, saying, Behold, the Lord came with many thousands of his holy ones to execute judgment upon all, and to convict all the ungodly of all their ungodly deeds, which they have done in an ungodly way, and of all the harsh things which ungodly sinners have spoken against him

So you live in the seventh generation of Adam And Enoch happens to be the preacher, the itinerant preacher of the day And he comes to your town And his words are, the King is coming with all of his holy ones to execute judgment upon all the ungodly, for all of their ungodly deeds And the emphasis is not on the love of God, but on the ungodliness of man and God's judgment upon his sin Why? Because he loved his generation And he didn't want them to perish

The number one thing you do that demonstrates your love way far and above everything else is that you look your son, your daughter, your husband, your wife, your friend in the eye and say, Judgment is coming The King is going to return If you do not repent of your sins, you will be judged and you will spend eternity away from God

Why is it we would not wake up every morning and say that exact same thing to our unsaved son, unsaved daughter every single day? Why would we not say that to our unsaved mother or unsaved father every single day? What would keep us from saying that? Well, they're going to get tired of hearing it Really? On the day of judgment, they're going to wish they heard it some more Well, they're going to be saying, okay, I heard enough, dad Shut up Don't talk to me anymore Don't want to hear anything else Be quiet, son. I've heard enough

Really? If you were to die today, if you were to die today, what would be the one thing your son, your daughter, your husband, your wife, your father, your mother would remember about what you told them? Just the one thing They always told me about the impending judgment upon man Why wouldn't you do that? What would keep you from doing that? I guess I really could say these words. I would question your love for that husband, for that wife, for that son, for daughter or daughter or mother or father. I would question your love for that person if that's not what you did every day

Because when it all comes down to one thing, only eternity matters Nothing on this earth matters Only eternity Amen Our Lord knew that And so he warned people of hell He would speak of a sin that was unforgivable, that if you committed it and you blasphemed against the spirit, your soul would be damned He talked about the weeping and gnashing of teeth in a place called Gehenna, the place of fire He would speak over and over again and warn man about what would happen if he did not repent If you don't repent, you will likewise perish

In other words, just by way of introduction, he would talk about judgment in various forms and allow judgment to happen in various capacities so people would experience the warning that would come You go all the way back to Sodom and Gomorrah, just by way of introduction, to Sodom and Gomorrah When I talk about terrible judgment, I talk about terrible judgment, that is judgment that happens on this earth, as opposed to eternal judgment that will cost man his life forever Go all the way back to Sodom and Gomorrah

In Genesis chapter 19, it was God's judgment upon an ungodly, immoral, sodomite city as a warning to those who want to live ungodly lives Go back to Joshua chapter 7, read about Achan and his family They took spoils from Jericho, which was something they were told not to do, and it cost Israel a battle to a very small little city because one person sinned, just one person Amidst two million Jews, one man and his family decided to sin against Almighty God, and it cost the whole nation a war Do you think your sin doesn't matter? Oh, believe me, it matters big time

That's why God put that in the Bible That's why Joshua prayed, and God revealed that it was that it was Achan and his family You go on and you can read about it in the book of Exodus with the ten plagues upon Egypt You can read about it in Mount Sinai with the worship of the golden calf In fact, Paul would even speak about it in the first Corinthians chapter 10, when he said these words, verse number one, for I do not want you to be unaware, brethren It's that familiar phrase, I don't want you to be ignorant. I don't want you to be caught unawares about the sins of Israel

Why? Brethren, that our fathers were all under the cloud and all passed through the sea and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea and all ate the same spiritual food and all drank the same spiritual drink, for they were drinking from a spiritual rock which followed them and that rock was Christ Nevertheless, with most of them God was not well pleased, for they were laid low in the wilderness That's a nice way of saying they died in the wilderness Now these things happen as, listen carefully, as examples for us Why did Israel die in the wilderness? To leave us an example

It says, these words, that we should not crave evil things as they also craved, and do not be idolaters as some of them were, as it is written, the people sat down to eat and drink and stood up to play Nor let us act immorally as some of them did and 23,000 fell in one day Nor let us try the Lord as some of them did and were destroyed by the serpent Nor grumble as some of them did and they were destroyed by the destroyer You know, Paul kind of covers the gamut, you know, he goes from what we think are the biggies to what we think are the littlies, but in God's eyes they're all biggies

From the grumbler to the idolater to the immoral person, there was judgment that came upon the nations There were warnings about what God thinks about sin, the seriousness of sin We don't take sin serious Somebody grumbles, and it's just the way they are Really? Oh, they're just that way? Really? You know what God says about them, don't you? God associates grumblers in the book of Jude with apostates Did you know that? He associates grumblers with apostates in Jude, verse, Jude 1, I think it's 17 and 18

That's what God thinks of grumblers, but we don't think of grumbling as a big deal, but yet there were many who died in the wilderness because they grumbled against the Lord

Didn't like what he fed them, didn't like where he led them, didn't like the water they had or the lack thereof, didn't like the bitter water they had, and God got a little tired of the grumbling, so he killed them as an example. I guess the question is, why didn't he kill him earlier? Why did he wait so long? Well, the same reason he doesn't kill you when you grumble, because he's patient, he's kind, he's merciful, but there are examples in scripture about the seriousness of sin, right? You go to the New Testament, what do you have? You have Ananias and Sapphira

Hey, they died in church because they lied about what they sold their house for And they lied and God killed them in church Can you imagine what would happen today if God killed people in church because they lied? There'd be a lot of dead bodies in church today. A warning of impending judgment Agrippa, King Agrippa, Herod Agrippa, in Acts 12, was boasting about his kingship, so God sent some worms to eat him alive and he died Pretty grotesque there in Caesarea Maritima to realize a man's pride would cost him his life Well, that's the way it is, that's what the Bible says

You read throughout the scriptures about the judgment that came upon Jerusalem Christ warned about that judgment that would come, and sure enough in 70 AD it did come because of their rebellion against the Lord God In Matthew 11, our Lord warned Capernaum, Bethsaida, Chorazin about their judgment because they had seen so many of the miracles of Christ, heard so many of his messages, but still were indifferent to what he said It's not that they outright rebelled against him because Capernaum, Bethsaida, and Chorazin never ran him out of town, never called him a bad name

They didn't want to throw him off a cliff and stone him like those in Nazareth did No, Capernaum was kind of, you know, apathetic to Jesus, lethargic to the message that he would give, just a little indifferent Yeah, we hear you Jesus, it sounds good, and we're just not ready to repent yet, and the Lord prophesied their destruction And if you go there today, there are ruins that are there because they would not respond to the gospel of Christ The Bible is filled with examples of impending judgment upon sinful ungodly man, and if you don't repent, the eternal judgment will come upon you

You must be ready You must know about the impending judgment that's going to come That's why John the Baptist, when he came, he said these words in Matthew chapter 3, as for me, I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, and I am not fit to remove a sandals He will baptize you with Holy Spirit and fire He's coming with fire judgment, and his winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will thoroughly clear his threshing floor, and he will gather his wheat into the barn, but he will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire

John the Baptist came, he was the forewarned of the Messiah, and he says, I've come to baptize you in water because of a desire to repent from your sin, but there's one coming after me, he's mightier than me, and he's coming with judgment Now they threw him in prison because they didn't like his message Then we hear that judgment stuff Threw him in prison, cut off his head Jesus said he was the greatest man to ever live, born of a woman, because he wasn't afraid to tell the truth, but he warned of impending judgment, the eternal judgment that would come upon man if he did not repent of his sin

Remember in Acts 24, Agrippa was gripped with fear, because the apostle Paul would talk to him about the judgment upon his life Remember that? Remember the Spirit of God, John 16, comes that he might convict the world of sin, righteousness, and what? And judgment, right? There's coming a judgment, and you need to understand what the Bible says concerning impending judgment

Peter said, 1 Peter 4, 17, for it is time for judgment to begin with the household of God, and if it begins with us first, what will be the outcome of those who do not obey the gospel of God? It's time, Peter says. I mean, folks, this is 2,000 years ago It is time for judgment to begin in the house of God It's time for God to judge his people that he might purge out the tares from among the wheat

It's time for judgment to begin, and if God is going to judge his people, can you imagine what the judgment will be like for those who are ungodly, who do not obey the gospel? And when you come to the book of Revelation, I'm just giving you snippets of what the Scriptures say You come to Revelation 14, and it says these words in in verse number 10

It says, we'll pick it up in verse number nine, and another angel, a third one, followed him saying with a loud voice, if anyone worships the beast in his image and receives a mark on his forehead or upon his hand, he also would drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is mixed in full strength in the cup of his anger, and he will be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels and in the presence of the lamb, and the smoke of their torment goes up forever and ever, and they have no rest day and night, those who worship the beast and his image and whoever receives the mark of his name

The angel warns of the judgment that's going to come upon all those who receive the mark of the beast, who worship his image It's going to come It goes on to say in Revelation 14 verse number 19, and the angel swung his sickle to the earth and gathered the clusters from the vine of the earth and threw them into the great wine press of the wrath of God, and the wine press was trodden outside the city and blood came out from the wine press up to the horse's bridles for a distance of 200 miles

In Revelation 19 when the king returns it says these words in Revelation 19, Revelation 19 verse number 15, and from his mouth comes a sharp sword so that with it he may smite the nations and he will rule them with a rod of iron, and he treads the wine press of the fierce wrath of God the Almighty Revelation 20 verse number 14, and death and Hades were thrown into the lake of fire This is the second death, the lake of fire, and if anyone's name was not found written in the book of life he was thrown into the lake of fire

So is it any wonder when the Olivet discourse Christ closes out a series of sermons he gives to his men about the end of the age, he says these words, and these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life Sometimes I think that we have forgotten what Jesus said while he was on earth We have misread what the Bible says concerning the consequences of sin, and thus we don't tell people what those consequences are We think we can do it tomorrow We think there's going to be another week We think there's going to be another vacation we'll spend with our friends

We think there's going to be another opportunity to tell them about impending judgment when God has given you the opportunity today The urgency of the moment Today is the day of salvation, not tomorrow Today if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts, is in the day of provocation Today the Bible emphasizes today is the day Do you tell them about the impending judgment? It's coming today where there will be a judgment of the nations It comes at the end of the times of the nations

We've been taking you through the sequence of events from the time the church is translated into glory to what happens in the tribulation to the time the king returns The times of the nations led us to understand the ruler of those nations, to the religion of the nations, to the war of the nations When the war is over there's a judgment, the judgment of the nations We want to talk to you about that judgment this evening in Matthew chapter 25 That you might come to grips with what's going to happen when the war is over because it's going to come Judgment is inevitable

Judgment is inescapable for the ungodly Those are the words we use with our loved ones Do you know that judgment is inevitable for you? Do you know that you won't be able to escape it? Do you know it's coming? Because Jesus told us so If you could just think that Jesus loved man so much, he would continually warn them that if they don't repent they will perish in eternal fire If you love your loved ones that much you will not let a day go by without telling them about the judgment that's inescapable if they do not repent Let me talk to you about this judgment by way of instruction

We'll look at the place of judgment or excuse me the person who judges, the period of this judgment, the place, the people, and the process It's in Matthew chapter 25 We're going to begin with the person who does all the judging It says in verse 25 or 31, but when the son of man comes Stop right there This is the person who does all the judging, the son of man Why did Jesus use that phrase over 80 times to describe himself, the son of man? Well we know from the prophecy of the book of Daniel in Daniel chapter 7

Daniel had a vision in verse 13. I kept looking in the night visions and behold with the clouds of heaven one like a son of man was coming And he came up to the ancient of days and was presented before him and to him was given dominion, glory, and a kingdom that all the people's nations and men of every language might serve him His dominion is an everlasting dominion which will not pass away and his kingdom is one which will not be destroyed Whenever Jesus used the title of son of man, a couple of things happened One, it emphasized his humiliation It emphasized his identification

And it would ultimately emphasize his exaltation because he was the son of man of Daniel chapter 7, the one who would come and his kingdom would endure forever He came as a son of man, as you recall, he came the first time to redeem man He comes the second time to reign over man When he came the first time nobody, nobody saw him except for Mary and Joseph and some angels and some wise men or some shepherds, excuse me The wise men would come later But when he comes again everybody is going to see him Every eye will see him When he came the first time he came to seek and to save

When he comes the next time he comes to search and to slaughter He's the son of man But being the son of man gave him all the credentials to be the judge of man because he was our high priest who was tempted at all points like we, yet without sin And the Bible says in the Gospel of John, the fifth chapter, the 22nd verse, for not even the father judges anyone but he has given all judgment to the son in order that all may honor the son even as they honor the father Verse 26, for just as the father has life in himself even so he gave to the son also to have life in himself

And he gave him authority to execute judgment because he is the son of man In the book of Acts, 17th chapter, verse 30, therefore having overlooked the times of ignorance God is now declaring to men that all everywhere should repent because he has fixed a day in which he will judge the world in righteousness through a man whom he has appointed having furnished proof to all men by raising him from the dead He is the son of man

The first time Jesus used that phrase, Matthew chapter 8, verse number 20, he said foxes have holes and birds of the air have nests but the son of man has no place to lay his head The last time the phrase is used of the son of man, Revelation 14, verse number 14 says this, and I looked and behold a white cloud and sitting on the cloud was one like a son of man having a golden crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand That's the last time the phrase the son of man is used to describe the coming king

Oh, by the way, in our story of the parable of the sheep and the goats in Matthew 25, the son of man is also called a shepherd and also called a king It says later on that in verse 32 that he will separate them from one another as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats Jesus is the chief shepherd The Bible says, verse 34, then the king will say to those on his right, the son of man is the king The son of man has come to take that which is rightfully his The first time he came in humiliation, he came to identify with the needs of man, to die for the sins of man

The second time he comes, he comes to reign as king of kings and lord of lords And the son of man is the king of all the earth That phrase son of man is his messianic title and whenever he used it, every Jew would know what Daniel 7, 13 and 14 said There would not be a Jew alive in the days of Jesus who did not understand that there's coming a day where the son of man will come on the clouds of great glory And every time Jesus, he could have said, I'm the king. I'm king of the Jews That's who I am. I am your king He didn't say that He says, I am the son of man

To let them know that the son of man was coming to judge Not the first time he came to redeem them, he would eventually come and judge them The person who does the judgment is the son of man He's the king of the world, the king of the nations Oh, by the way, Revelation 14, 15, verse number three calls him the king of the nations He is the king of the nations The nations don't recognize them as his king, but Revelation 15, three says, oh yes, he is the king of the nations And when he returns the son of man and all of his glory, he comes to show the nations that yes, he is the true king

The second thing I want you to see outside the person is the period in which this judgment takes place But when the son of man comes in his glory, when does this happen? It happens when he comes in his glory It happens when he returns The Bible says over in the book of Matthew, the 24th chapter, the 29th verse, but immediately after the tribulation of those days, the sun will be darkened and the moon will not give its light and the stars will fall from the sky and the powers of the heavens will be shaken And then the sign of the son of man will appear in the sky

What is the sign of the son of man? And then all the tribes of the earth will mourn and they will see the son of man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory The sign of the son of man is the brightness of his character When you speak of the glory of God, remember the Bible says in 1st Timothy 6, he dwells in unapproachable light No man can look upon him and live because he is so pure and so holy, so bright That's why he's called the God of light, right? And that light was shown to all men when he arrived, but that the fullness of his glory was clothed in his human flesh

But it didn't make him less glorious, not at all In fact, it made him more glorious because he came to die in order that his father would be glorified, be magnified, which speaks of not only the brightness of the sun, but the beauty of the sun, the beauty of the sun That's the sign of the son of man, his brightness, his beauty, his bigness, because all the world will see the coming of the Messiah The Bible says in Matthew 24 in verse 31 that he will send forth his angels with a great trumpet and they will gather together his elect from the four winds from one end of the earth to the other

Verse 31 of chapter 25 says he will come in his glory and all the angels with him Folks, that's a lot of people, all the angels with him Oh, by the way, Revelation 19 says that we are coming in white robes, the church In fact, Revelation 19 verse number 11 says, and I saw heaven open The first time John saw heaven open was Revelation 4 verse number 1 And what did he see? He saw the 24 elders, which we know is representative of the church of Christ, in heaven The first time he saw heaven open, there was a rapture of the saints

The second time he sees heaven open, there's a return of the Savior with his saints Revelation 19 verse number 11 So he's going to return in his glory, in the beauty of his brightness He will come and he will come with his angels, all his angels, and he will come with the armies of heaven, those of us who are clothed in white garments, which signifies, as Revelation 2 and 3 state, the church of Jesus Christ, the saints, the overcomers We're going to come too The period of this judgment is at the end of the tribulation

It's at the end when the armies of God have gathered together in Armageddon, and they begin to make their way down the Jezreel Valley, down through the Jordan Valley, down through the Judean wilderness, in order that they might fight Israel and come against God's people in the land of Edom, in a place called Bozrah In that vicinity, we know from Isaiah chapter 63, Isaiah 34, Malachi chapter 2, also Habakkuk chapter 3, we know that that place is where the Lord himself will descend, because he has made war with man

And the king himself will descend upon Edom, upon Bozrah, because that's where the nation of Israel has gone, according to Revelation chapter 12 They have fled to the wilderness, which is Edom and Moab in the Old Testament So we know exactly where that place is located, and the Messiah will come, and because of the brightness of his glory, he will speak a word, and he will slaughter those who have come against him He will make his way up the Judean wilderness, up through the Jordan Valley, to land on the Mount of Olives He comes in his glory He comes to do battle

He comes to begin his rule and reign on this earth That's the period Notice that when Jesus first came, judgment was on him When he comes a second time, judgment is by him That is so good to know Your judgment was placed on him We'll talk a little bit about that on Sunday, when it talks about the certificate of forgiveness, of all your sins were forgiven Your judgment was placed on him, but when he comes a second time, he comes to inflict judgment upon man, thus the judgment of the nations The third thing I want you to see is the place of judgment

The place of judgment, it says in verse number 31 still, but when the Son of Man comes in his glory and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne Wait a minute. I thought the throne of God was in heaven What throne is there? Well there was a promise given, an Abrahamic promise, a Davidic promise, the Abrahamic promise dealing with a land, and the Davidic promise dealing with the Lord who rules over that land That promise was never rescinded In Jeremiah 23 verses 5 and 6, it says the branch is going to come He's going to come to the land

What land is that? Well Psalm 2 tells us Psalm 2 is very critical to understanding the coming of the Messiah And it says in verse number 6, but as for me, I have installed my king upon Zion, my holy hill The place of this judgment is going to take place when he sits on his glorious throne in the city of Jerusalem on Mount Zion, because that was the promise

Over in Luke chapter 1, the angel Gabriel said to Mary, he will be great, verse 32, and will be called the Son of the Most High, and the Lord God will give him the throne of his father David, and he will reign over the house of Jacob forever, and his kingdom will have no end He's going to give him the throne of his father David He's going to arrive and sit on his throne The Bible says in Isaiah 9 verses 6 and 7, that there's going to be a kingdom, and the government will be upon the shoulders of that king who rules over the land of Jerusalem

Listen to what the Bible says in the book of Zechariah Zechariah chapter 14, verse number 4, Zechariah 14, verse number 4, it says, and in that day his feet will stand on the Mount of Olives, which is in the front of Jerusalem on the east The Mount of Olives will be split in its middle from east to west by a very large valley, so that half of the mountain will move toward the north, and the other half toward the south The Bible says in the book of Joel, the third chapter, these words, verse 14, multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision

For the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision The sun and moon grow dark, and the stars lose their brightness And the Lord roars from Zion, and utters his voice from Jerusalem And the heavens and the earth tremble But the Lord is a refuge for his people, and a stronghold of the sons of Israel Then you will know that I am the Lord your God, dwelling in Zion, my holy mountain So Jerusalem will be holy, and strangers will pass through it no more And we showed you on Sunday exactly where that place is going to be

We showed you on Sunday exactly where the valley of Jehoshaphat is located We showed you on Sunday where it is that there is called a valley called Kidron, or the valley of decision And what you have is Jerusalem This is what is called Mount Zion right here This whole thing Mount Zion was where the city of David is today, or where David was, you know, some 4,000 years ago Back over here there's a little hill called the hill of Ophel It's about a little over 30 acres It's where the city of David was They're excavating that place today That was Mount Zion

But David would purchase this place up here from Arun of the Jebusite, the threshing floor of Arun of the Jebusite He would purchase it so that Solomon, his son, would build the temple on this place Mount Zion grew from the hill of Ophel up to this place which we call Moriah, Mount Moriah, the place seen by God Down below, if you could hold that for me for a second, please Down below this eastern gate is a valley Up here is the Mount of Olives That valley is called the valley of decision, or the valley of Jehoshaphat, or the Kidron Valley

And so when the king returns to Bozrah, to Edom, which is 50 miles south of the Dead Sea, someplace in that vicinity, makes his way up the Judean wilderness He makes his way to this mount called the Mount of Olives He splits this mount, half of it to the north, half of it to the south And he roars from Zion He has to split the mountain, because if he doesn't split the mountain, the valley will not be big enough to hold all the people that need to be judged See? Every time we go to Jerusalem, we pass over and around that valley every single day, at least three times in Jerusalem

And I'm always reminded of the fact that one day this is the place where the judgment of God, the judgment of the nations, will happen That's the place That's what the Bible says There's no question about where the place is The Bible is very clear And that place will come as surely as God has said it So who are the people that are going to be judged? This is quite an interesting conversation. I wish I had time to talk to you about this, because you know sometimes I have to go back and listen to my tapes to figure out what I believe And what I once said

And it's interesting to know what the Bible says It says that all the nations will be gathered before him All the nations Who's that? There comes a question And I'm not going to tell you necessarily which one I believe But the question comes is that when Jesus returns, are all the nations killed or are there some Gentile nations still alive? If you read the Old Testament prophets If you read Psalm 46 verses 6 and 9 Ezekiel 38 and Ezekiel 39 In Zephaniah chapter 1 verses 14 to 18 And Revelation 19 verse number 17 and 18 You're led to believe that every man alive dies when Jesus returns

You're led to believe that Because that's what it says Zephaniah says he destroys all the inhabitants of the earth Well how much is that? Well that's all the inhabitants of the earth Okay We know that there's a third, a remnant of Israel that's saved Right? We know that Zechariah 13 Two thirds are set apart Two thirds are judged They die Another third is a remnant which is the equivalent to the all of Romans 11 All Israel will be saved All is the one third that's left when the king returns They go into the kingdom

Right? They'll be there because we know from chapter 24 verse number 31 that the angels who return with them gather all the elect from the four winds of the earth The four corners of the earth So all those people who came to Christ because of the 144,000 And by the way in Revelation 14.1 the 144,000 Jewish evangelists stand on top of Mount Zion with the king So we know they're going to be there We know the holy angels are going to be there All of them because that's what the Bible said We know from Revelation 19 that you and I are going to be there

Who else is going to be there? The nations of the world But if they're all dead how do you judge them? Think about it this way Bible says absent from the body present with the what? Lord Where's the Lord going to be present at? Mount Zion Mount Zion Could it be that everybody who's a Gentile dies and their souls are presented for judgment of the nations? That could be. I'm not saying it is necessarily But it could very well be that Based on Zephaniah, Revelation 19, Psalm 46, and Ezekiel 38 and 39 You're led to believe that everybody dies when the king returns

Or there could be some Gentiles left over and they are gathered together and they are put for judgment the value of decision. I'll let you come to that conclusion based on what the Bible says But know this There is a judgment And there's a judgment of all the Gentile nations of that day Whether they're there in body or whether they're there in soul they will be judged Because the king is present among them What's the process? I must hurry Here's the process

Are you ready? It says, and all the nations will be gathered before him and he will separate them from one another as a shepherd separates his sheep from the goats He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on the left Then the king will say to those on his right, come you who are blessed of my Father and here at the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me drink. I was a stranger and you invited me in naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison and you came to me

Then the righteous will answer him saying, Lord when did we see you hungry and feed you or thirsty and give you drink? When did we see a stranger invite you in or naked and clothe you? And when did we see you sick or in prison and come to you? And the king will answer and say to them, truly I say to you to the extent that you did it to the least or to one of these my brothers, even the least of them you did it as unto me Now if you read that you would think that the sheep are the ones who did good deeds and the goats are the ones who didn't do good deeds Because it goes on to say these words

Then he will also say to those on his left, apart from me accursed ones into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink. I was a stranger and you did not invite me in naked and you did not clothe me Sick and in prison and you did not visit me

Then they themselves will also answer saying, Lord when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not take care of you? Then he will answer them saying, truly I say to you to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these you did not do it to me You read that you think well I guess the sheep are the ones who do the good deeds and the goats are the ones who don't do the good deeds Well the answer to that is well yes and no That's the answer to that Notice what the text says The text says this The king will say to those on his right

Remember the right hand is the hand of blessing, the hand of honor, the hand of inheritance Remember way back in Genesis chapter 48 when Jacob blessed Manasseh and Ephraim Jacob couldn't see He was blind So Joseph made sure that Manasseh was on his right and Ephraim was on his left because Manasseh was the firstborn and Joseph wanted the firstborn to receive the rightful heir to be the blessed one What did Jacob do? Cross his hands and Ephraim became the blessed one, the rightful heir to the inheritance The right hand is the hand of blessing Who's the blessed one? Psalm 32

Blessed is he whose transgressions are forgiven They're the forgiven ones It says come you who are blessed by my father inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world Wait a minute That speaks of election That speaks of choosing They are the ones who inherit Only a family member can inherit the blessing and we are children of the living God, right? How do we become a child of the living God? We believed in the one who died for our sins We become the rightful heir to the throne We are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ We're adopted into the family of God

We are rightful heirs to the kingdom because we are rightful to receive the inheritance Why? Because we've been blessed of our father Why? Because there's been a kingdom prepared for us when? From the foundation of the world That's why And notice what it says It says in verse 37 Then the righteous will answer Will the righteous or the sheep? How does anyone obtain righteousness? 2 Corinthians 5 21 He who did no sin became sin for us that we might be made what? The righteousness of God in him And Romans 3 10 says there is none righteous, no not one

So the only way to obtain Christ's righteousness is because it's been imputed to us by Christ himself He gave us his righteousness Notice it says and the righteous answer And for the goats it says, verse 44, then they themselves also will answer Not the righteous, they themselves Big difference, right? Because the righteous are part of the family The righteous are blessed because they've been forgiven The righteous are there because they've been prepared from the foundation of the world because they were chosen by God

And because they were, listen carefully, they acted sacrificially and they didn't even know it Because sacrificial love is innate to the character of the believer It's part of his life And that's why, when did we see you naked? When did we see you in prison? When did we see you hungry? When did we see you thirsty? When did we see you? We didn't see that Jesus said, when you did to the least of these my brother Who's that? That's the Jewish nation It's the Jewish nation Why? Because the tribulation is a time of Jacob's trouble The Antichrist goes after Israel to persecute them, to kill them

Who's going to protect them? Other Gentile believers who can give them something to eat, who can give them something to drink, who can feed them They'll take them in They'll love them They'll nurture them They'll take care of them Why? Because when you did it as to them, you did it as unto me, Jesus said Why? Paul said, in Galatians 2.20, I've been crucified with Christ Christ lives in me If Christ lives in me, he lives in you as a child of God

And when you do the sacrificial act to me, Paul says, or Christ says, when you do it to the least of these, you did it as if you did it to me because I am in them You saw me in them because I am in you Therefore, you sacrificially gave your life away You risked your own life to clothe, to feed, to give a drink of water, to visit the least of these my brethren And they didn't even know they did it because it's so innate to their character And for the goats, the unbelievers, he says, when I was hungry, you didn't feed me When I was thirsty, you didn't give me anything to drink

And they said, we never saw you hungry When did we see you hungry, thirsty, naked, in prison, unclothed? You see, today, there's a lot of unbelievers who do many good works, right? They travel around the country They feed the poor And you know what they do that for? Only one reason It's not because of love, except for the love of self That's it We hold them up as people who sacrificially give themselves away And they love people They go to other countries They adopt them, bring them back They feed the poor They do all kinds, they do it because they want the affirmation of man

And they want the acceptance of God because they love themselves That's why they do it There's no other reason They would say, oh, no, no, that's not why Yes, it is Yes, it is Because in Matthew 7, people say, well, Lord, we prophesied your name We did good deeds We did it all for you, Jesus He said, what? I never knew you You didn't do it for me You did it for you You did it for you But the godly person does it, and he doesn't even know he's doing it The ungodly person does it, and he knows he's doing it because he gets acceptance from man and affirmation, he thinks, from God

But the unbeliever does it because it's part of his divine nature that's inside of him because God himself, the divine, is here, and we are partakers of his divine nature That's a process of judgment You didn't do anything for me You did everything for you, which leads us to the implication. I have four minutes There are two people There are two places That's it There are two kinds of people in the world There are sheep, and there are goats There are wheat, and there are tares They're the godly, the ungodly They are the saints They are the sinners

There are those who love God, and those who love themselves Only two kinds of people What kind of person are you? And there are only two places you can go, heaven or hell, the place of pain or the place of pleasure, the place of joy or the place of judgment That's it There's no holding place There's no purgatory That's a fallacy sold to you by the Catholic Church That's not true There's no holding place Jesus says these words He says, these will go away into eternal punishment and the righteous into eternal life Is heaven forever? Yes

Is hell forever? Oh, yes. A lot of people today believe in annihilationism, but it says that heaven is eternal It says that hell is also eternal And Jesus concludes His Sermon on the Mount, Sermon on the Mount of Olives And then look at this verse, chapter 1 of verse 26 And it came about that when Jesus had finished all these words, He said to His disciples, you know that after two days the Passover is coming and the Son of Man is to be delivered up for crucifixion Make sure you get perspective, guys

This is what's going to happen at the end. I'm the Son of Man. I'm the shepherd. I'm the judge. I'm the king But just remember, it's time for me to go and to die for your sins and for the sins of the world Do you believe that? I trust that you do Let's pray Father, thank You for today, a chance to be in Your Word for a brief moment of time, to be reminded once again of the impending judgment, the inescapable judgment upon man, and how we are held accountable The Bible says, knowing the terror of the Lord, we persuade men May we be those persuaders to help people know about Jesus, the Savior

In Jesus' name, Amen.