Marcus Mecum - 5 Attitudes In The Last Days - Part 1
Matthew 24, let’s look at verse 1. «Jesus went out and departed from the temple, and his disciples came up to show him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said to them, 'do you not see these things? Assuredly I say to you, not one stone shall be left here upon another that shall not be overthrown, '» or thrown down. «Now as he sat down at the mount of olives, the disciples came to him privately saying, 'tell us when will these things be'»? That’s question number one. Question two, «'and what will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age'? And Jesus answered to them,» this is so interesting to me, «And said, 'take heed to yourself that no one deceives you'».
Everybody say, «Take heed… for many will come in my name saying, 'I am the Christ, '» Christ means anointed one. It may be that they’re saying that they’re the Messiah, but most places where you see the same concept, it’s that people are going to come saying, «I’m the most anointed one. I am the one that knows the truth. I have a corner on truth. My interpretation of scripture is the best interpretation. I’m right, everybody else is wrong. Don’t listen to them, listen to me».
That’s primarily where deception comes in. I just wanna help you out real quick. Every single interpretation of the scripture at some level is flawed because the people that interpret it are flawed. Right? Doesn’t mean that we still don’t work towards understanding the scripture, it just simply means that we have to be cautious thinking that we’re right about everything all the time. You okay with that? Which by the way, you don’t have to agree with everybody on every point. If you need to agree with everybody on every point, can I just help you? You’re gonna have no friends. You will have zero friends. You go live in a cave somewhere and be right. To get along with people, you’re gonna have to recognize I may or may not be right about certain things.
So he’s like, «Hey, they’re gonna come. I’m this, I’m that, I’m the greatest. They’re not good, avoid them, avoid that'». Be careful with that, be careful because deception comes through that. «And you will hear of wars and rumors of wars. See that you’re not troubled,» everybody say, «Troubled… For all these things must come to pass but the end is not yet. Nation will rise against nation,» that word translates ethnicity or «Race against race, kingdom against kingdom. There will be famines, pestilence, earthquakes in various places. All these are the beginning of sorrows. Then they,» this is good news, «Then they will deliver you up for tribulation and kill you». Praise God.
Who’s excited about the last days? «And you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. And then many will be offended». Everybody say, «Offended… And will betray one another and hate one another. Then many false prophets,» there it is again, a similar thing. And what will they rise to do? To deceive many. «Because lawlessness will abound and the love of many will grow cold. But he who endures to the end,» everybody say, «Endure. Endures to the end shall be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom,» I love this word, «Will be preached,» can’t nothing stop it. «In all the world as a witness to all nations and then the end will come».
I wanna talk to you for just a few moments on five attitudes, five attitudes that you’re to have in the last days. Five attitudes that you’re to grab a hold of in the last days. Now, any time you hear a message on end times, it’s very important that you remember that it’s always a message of victory. It’s never a message of defeat. In this particular story that we read, I like it because of how it begins. It’s somewhat humorous because the disciples have Jesus and they’re giving him a tour of Herod’s temple, and they’re showing him this building, and they’re mesmerized by how great this structure is. It’s really the restoration of the former great Solomon’s temple, or an effort at that.
And they’re so impressed by what has been built by the hands of men that they’re showing Jesus all of the characteristics and the architecture of this great temple. And while they’re showing this, I’m guessing they’re even looking at the stones of the foundation that are about the size of a semi-truck, the average size is that. Many are much larger than that. Many would be the size of this stage. And they’re so awestruck by what they’re looking at, and they look at Jesus, and Jesus is not only not impressed, but he says to them, «All the stuff that you see, all these buildings that you’re impressed with, not one of them will remain. They’re all be destroyed, and every stone that you see will be destroyed. Not one of them will be left unturned».
And the disciples hear this, they see that, and they’re taken back. They begin some conversations with one another and later that day at the mount of olives, they come to Jesus and they have some questions for him. And the questions that they want to ask him, we mentioned earlier, question number one was when will the end of the world be? This deals with timing. And secondly, what will be the signs of your coming? Well, Jesus is a master at answering questions, normally by answering the question with a question. But sometimes, he avoids the question all together and gets right to the heart of the matter. And they seem to be taken back because of his answers.
They wanna know what the signs are going to be. He doesn’t give them impressive signs. They’re not awestruck by the signs that he gives them. They wanna hear things like, «What does the eclipse mean? Tell me about the blood moons. How many blood moons and what does it all mean. Who’s the Antichrist? Talk to us about the Mark of the beast». And nothing wrong with that stuff. We talk about that stuff at times when we go through this. But Jesus jumps right over all of those questions and he goes straight for five attitudes that you and I are to have when we see these things come to pass.
Five things to focus on, five things to give your affection to, five things to say, «I’m not gonna be distracted by all of this. I’m gonna have this attitude». He does give some signs, but they’re vague. He talks about race against race, nation against nation. He talks about earthquakes in various places. He talks about wars and rumors of wars. Again, very vague type of things that would almost every generation would be affected by, so then he goes into these five attitudes.
Number one, and we’re gonna spend most of our time on this one, and then I’ll go really fast with the last four. Not because one’s more important than the other, but it’s just how it came together. Number one attitude, he said, «Take heed to yourselves». You’re not to be distracted by what’s going on in the world to such a degree that you lose sight of what’s happening in here. So, when you start seeing things like an effort towards one world government, a cashless society, you start seeing the systems of this world being set up for the Antichrist to rise. When you see all of that stuff, it’s possible that you’ll be so distracted by all of that that you’ll miss the most important attitude, and that is take heed to yourself.
The most important thing that you can grab a hold of is Jesus is saying it’s not what’s happening out there, it’s what’s happening in here. Whatever is going on in the world, you can say, «How’s my relationship with Jesus? How’s my passion for God? What is it that I’m focused on? What is it that I’m looking at? What is it that I’m giving my affection to? How’s my heart? How’s my life? How am I living? How’s my personal holiness? Is my mind clean»? Take heed to yourselves. The word take heed means take inventory. Yes, look around, yes, be alert. Yes, be vigilant. Don’t bury your head in the sand. He’s not saying that, he’s saying, «But don’t get so focused trying to fix things that are out of your control that you lose sight of what is in your control».
You can’t control world war iii, but you can control the war that’s going on in your own soul or your own home. So, take heed to yourself. He says the important reason for this is because this is how deception happens. And he begins to mention false teachers or false prophets. And this is in the Bible so I have to take some time to talk about it, even though I normally avoid this thing. Not because I’m afraid, but because it’s actually surprising to people that actually study the Bible, not hear someone call someone else a false teacher, but people that study the Bible, they’re often surprised by who the false teachers are. Now, let’s go to 2 Timothy 2 and we’ll kinda deal with this because every time Paul deals with a false teacher, there are doctrinal things that he deals with, but it’s mostly surrounding what we would call the Nicene Creed, or the Apostle’s Creed type things.
Augustine would say it like this, «In essentials we have unity, in non-essentials, we have freedom or liberty, in all things we have charity,» or love. Right, so, it’s important that you identify that most of the time, and we’ll see this with Paul’s writing, who the false teachers are, are really trying to distract you by focusing on things that do not matter. They’re non essentials, right? They’re non essentials. They’re not, talking about do they believe Jesus died for your sin? Do they believe he raised from the dead? Do they believe that the Bible is God’s word, is inspired, it’s truth? That’s normally not what they’re focused on. They’re over here on a little quote, a little sentence, or some other personality trait that they don’t like.
And so, let me tell you why as a church we should spend a little bit of time looking at what a false teacher is from Paul’s perspective, not my perspective, or anybody else’s perspective. This is why it’s important. And I’m looking for no empathy from this, I’m looking for, I know what I’ve signed up for, I’m a grown man, I’ve seen the blood in the carnage of what I do. I’ve looked demons that you can’t imagine in the eyes to fight and carve out a place where God’s presence could dwell and we could be a place that wins souls for the kingdom. I’m not looking for empathy. I’m plenty capable of knowing what I signed up for. But I want church people to understand a little bit more about what’s going on in the world.
Okay, 95% of pastors that begin in the ministry never make it to the age of retirement. Only 5% make it. That means one out of twenty don’t make it. Eighty-five percent of pastors in churches right now, small and large, are actively looking for a way to get out of doing what they’re doing. I’m setting the conditions for what we’re about to read. I’m trying to help you understand that when you decide to become a pastor, and again, I’m not speaking about me, I’m setting the conditions because I have another generation coming up behind me. We have another generation that’s coming up. And what they don’t understand many times is that 1,400 pastors every month leave the ministry. And it’s not because they’re cowards, and it’s not because they’re weak, and it’s not because they’re scared.
It’s because more than likely, like when you go to war, they signed up when they were fairly young and dumb, and they didn’t realize that they were gonna be shipped off to Normandy, and the chance of them surviving, they’re going to get shot, probably going to be fatal. And it’s not that they’re even that scared of the enemy whose beach they’re storming as much as they are scared about the nervous people behind them that are supposed to be on their side that are shooting them because of friendly fire. So, pastors are getting taken out. I’m not defending it, I’m helping you realize the conditions for just a moment. Right? I want you to understand it because we have a generation of people coming up that are probably not wanting to do this because they’re actually now beginning to see the risk level like never before.
And we, at some point, have to say, «We need people that will jump on the front lines and storm hell’s territory for us, and we should have them be worried about friendly fire». I’m not saying they’re perfect, I’m not saying they’re not flawed, I’m not saying there’s not bad ones, I’m not saying that there’s not abuses, I’m just saying. Let me show you where this really got in my spirit. Last Sunday night, we had a prayer time. At the end of the prayer time, I looked over and my grandson was over there with Luke. And I could see that he was wanting to get on the table, so I was like, on the station.
So, I said, «Just come on». Well, he’s never done this. There’s no training, there’s nothing. So, they got a video. I want you to see this. I thought he wanted to come and hug me, he didn’t. He wants to lead the church in worship. He’s a natural. I mean, just born to do it is what you’d think. And it was so cute but I’m a grandpa. And on the way home, I thought to myself, «I have to work hard enough. I have to do something to make sure he doesn’t do this». It’s not that I am a victim, it’s a privilege to do what I do. But I begin to worry about, «God, I don’t know if I want you to call him». And so, I wanna show you how you know who a false teacher is so you don’t shoot people with friendly fire, okay?
So, we know whose side we’re on. Alright so let’s look at it. 2 Timothy 2:14, this is dealing with false teachers. «Keep reminding God’s people of these things,» Paul’s telling Timothy, his spiritual son. «Keep reminding God’s people of these things, warn them before God against quarreling about with words». Isn’t that interesting? This is what I want to debate, I wanna fight, I wanna argue, I wanna criticize, I wanna attack. «It’s of no value, and it only ruins those who listen». You know what he’s saying? He’s saying when you have two parents that fight in front of the kids, you know who loses? The kids. So, if you have an unhealthy parent that’s trying to drag the other parent and the healthy parent should say, «The only way we’re fighting is we get behind that door and we talk about it. We do not fight in front of the kids». It ruins the hearers.
So, what did he say? «Do your best». Not be perfect in presenting yourself to God as one approved. But just do your best. «Do your best to present yourself to God as one approved, a worker who does not need to be ashamed, who correctly handles the word of truth». Watch this, he’s talking about false teachers. «Avoid Godless chatter, because those who indulge in it,» that’s what people want you to do. They wanna drag you into some fight and some debate on who’s right, who’s the anointed one, who’s the gifted, who has the right version, who has the right doctrine, who has the right this. It’s Godless chatter. And those who indulge in it become more ungodly, more hateful, more hateful, more hateful. The crucify him crowd is not on God’s side. The one that’s trying to burn everybody at the stake, that’s not on God’s side. Not saying that we don’t take stands, I’m saying that we take stands with grace, we take stands with love.
Now, watch what it says. «Their teaching was spread like gangrene,» we’ll talk about that in a minute. «Among them are Hymenaeus and Philetus who have departed from the truth,» again, they have a misunderstanding of the resurrection that Jesus Christ is alive, «They destroy the faith of some. Nevertheless, God’s solid foundation stands firm, and we’re sealed with this inscription: 'the Lord knows those who are his'». Isn’t that beautiful? So, the bottom line of a false teacher, the first quality that you see is they call other people false teachers. That’s how you know. The moment someone takes somebody’s picture and they put it up here and says, «This person’s bad and I’m good,» probably your warning. It’s a quiet church. But I wanna show you how Paul talked about it, not how I’m gonna talk about it. I don’t have no picture of anybody up here. But this is what he said.
So, he introduces these two people, Philetus and Alexander. And the way that this worked is Paul would go into a community, and he would win people to Christ. He would disciple them, he would love them, he would establish the foundation of a church. Eventually, he would find a young person, a young man, a leader to come and pastor that church. And then Paul would move on to another city, win some people to Christ, begin to build a church there. Or he will go check on another church, or many times he’s in prison. That’s when he’s writing this letter. So, when he’s not in prison, he’s planting churches, taking care of churches, building churches. When he is in prison, he’s sending letters like this to young pastors like Timothy talking to them about how they’re going to run into different obstacles as leaders. Not knowing that this letter is going to get into the cannon of scripture and that we’re going to read it at the time.
So, that’s what Paul is primarily doing. And he says, «So what happen is I’m here, I plant this church, I win these people to Christ, I teach them, I give them a basic foundation, I put a pastor over them, I move on to this next place, and then people come in behind me, and they start eroding away at what I’ve done, who I am, and what I’ve taught them». If you read the commentaries, this is exactly what it says these people did and almost every letter from Paul, you see him dealing with these people. They all felt a need to come in behind Paul’s back and correct his teaching. They were corrective in saying Paul is inadequate or incomplete, and their claim, this is, read any commentary.
Take this, go home and study it. They claim to have a superior understanding of God, God’s word, and God’s will than Paul. In other words, Paul is inferior, we’re the anointed ones. What are the Marks of these people? They quarrel about with words, Godless chatter. For what? The ruin of the hearer. To cause a lack of confidence in the person that God has put out front storming the beach. Let me put it in a way that we live in our day with this. Have you ever heard of the 12th man in football? Do you know that there are football teams that are known by their 12th man?
If you go to the Seattle Seahawks for example, they’re known by the decibel levels of the fans in the crowd? They call it the 12th man. There are 11 men on the field and there’s the 12th man who is the crowd. And their noise level determines how they participate in the game. Well, the primary way a 12th man comes into play is when their team is on defense. When their team is on defense, what happens is you get to third down or maybe you’re at the goal line and they don’t want the other team to score, so they increase the noise level, they start screaming, they start shouting, they start doing anything they can do to cause miscommunication, misunderstanding, and confusion on the field so the offense does not advance, right?
They’re not on the field, they’re just making noise about what’s happening to cause confusion. If you’ve ever been to a basketball game, you would see this. The person’s at the free throw line. And behind the basketball goal, there’s all kinds of people with their noodles, and they got noise things, they’re doing all kind of things that they can. They’ve got signs, and their goal is to distract the person at the free throw line from putting the ball through the hoop. The person at the free throw line does not get off the court and go to those in the crowd and try to make sure that they understand where they’re coming from. «Do you like me? Would you understand me? I don’t want you to think of me like I’m that bad».
No, he already knows they’re on the opposing team. He already knows that. They’re the 12th man. And he’s got a job to do, and that job that he’s been qualified to be right there at that moment, and he has to know who’s qualified him to be there, and that’s not the distracters in the crowd, and he stands up to free throw line. And the more he can remove the distractions, the more he can put that ball through that net and score over and over again. And what Paul is telling Timothy, «Timothy, do not be distracted. I’ve called you, I’ve anointed you, I’ve placed you in the game, I want you to storm those beaches, I want you to make the play, I want you to move the ball down the field, I want you to put the ball through the hoop, I want you to win souls, preach the gospel. That’s what I want you to do».