Pastor Barry's  "Chapter & Verse"  Day 351

December 17;       Mark 13:3;       41/260;       ‘The Future is in His Hands’

Mark 13:3 Now as He sat on the Mount of Olives opposite the temple, Peter, James, John, and Andrew asked Him privately,

The Lord Jesus in this verse and passage is beginning to teach His disciples about end times.  The disciples asked Him questions about this future time (which we are rapidly approaching).  Please understand this – Jesus Christ, the Word of God, knows the future.  You cannot listen to what you hear on the news, be terrified by the threat of a nuclear confrontation or what science fiction movies show.  Truthfully, neither Hollywood nor TV have the right to call their ideas of the future by biblical terms like Armageddon. Almighty God ‘calls the shots’ and no one else.  We are not going to starve, run out of clean water, drown because the ice caps melt or die because the air is polluted.  The future will be exactly what the Lord teaches in His Word. That it will be.  If you are a Christian, before the Lord begins to deal with the Jews concerning Himself and an unbelieving world that has rejected Him (the tribulation), the Church will be ‘raptured,’ that means taken to heaven before any of this starts.  The Lord always got His people out before judgment fell.  Noah and his family were protected during the flood and Lot and his family left before the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. I do believe there will be easily discernable signs as we approach end times.  It is easy to see the escalation of the viciousness of people and moral depravity.  That is a sign.  Rather than be fearful, seeing this should make us that much more determined to reach the lost for Jesus.  If you are Born Again you are fine, we want to make sure as many others as we can reach will be fine too.  Ultimately this is all