9 Signs of the Last Days Global Reckoning: Joel 3:1-21
Bible 25% prophecy. Jesus is center of History (1st & 2nd Coming; BC/AD)
The Day of the Lord = THEME (8X = 1xJoel 1; 5x Joel 2; 2x Joel 3)
- Last days = between 1st 2nd Coming (times of judgment to warn us)
- “The Day of the Lord” – 2nd Coming & RECKONING
= Destruction & Deliverance
Do you believe we are living in the endtimes? All US adults 39%
#1. An increase in anxiety, anarchy, and sexual sin
2 Timothy 3:1 “in the last days there will come times of difficulty. For people will be lovers of self, lovers of money, proud, arrogant, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, heartless, unappeasable, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not loving good, treacherous, reckless, swollen with conceit, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God…”
· Social Media
#2. Scoffing and mocking of the Bible and Bible-believing Christians
2 Peter 3:3 “scoffers will come in the last days with scoffing…
Jude 18 “In the last time there will be mockers, following after their own ungodly lusts.”
· Negative World
#3. Lying and false teaching is loved, truth and Bible preaching is hated
2 Timothy 4:1-4 “preach the word…the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching, but having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions,and will turn away from listening to the truth”
· Internet. AI. Deepfakes = Demonic Door
#4. Widespread “Christian” apostasy, paving the way for the Antichrist
1 John 2:18-19 “it is the last hour…antichrist is coming…many antichrists have come….it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us.”
· Jesus? 1. Worshipped 2. Weaponized
#5. Wealth and comfort leaves people thinking they don’t need God or Heaven
James 5:3 Your gold and silver have corroded, and their corrosion will be evidence against you and will eat your flesh like fire. You have laid up treasure in the last days.
· A little hell on earth prepares you for Heaven. Comfort or Christ?
#6. God will restore the nation of Israel and Jerusalem
Joel 3:1 “For behold, in those days and at that time, when I restore the fortunes of Judah and Jerusalem,
– 2000 BC God called Abraham to leave his family to receive the Promised Land of Israel
– Roughly 30 AD Jesus Christ lives, dies, and rises in Israel
– From 138 AD onward Israel did not exist as a nation and Jews were scattered globally
– From 1933-1945 Hitler’s holocaust sought to eliminate the Jews
– On May 14,1948 Israel became a nation for the first time in over 1800 years
– On May 14, 2018 (70 years to the day) President Trump recognizes Jerusalem as the Capitol of Israel despite 14 of the 15 United Nations Security Council members voting no. This is the first time a major world leader recognized Jerusalem for 2500 years since the Persian King Cyrus.
#7. Nations will surround Israel to destroy it completely it
Joel 3:2 I will gather all the nations and bring them down to the Valley of Jehoshaphat [“Yahweh judges”].
Revelation14:14,16 For they are demonic spirits, performing signs, who go abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty. And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon.
Zechariah 14:1-3 Behold, a day is coming for the LORD, when…I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle…Then the LORD will go out and fight against those nations as when he fights on a day of battle.
- 3:2 “ALL NATIONS” – Push Israel Podcast (size/pop NJ)
Iran & Proxies (Houthis, Hamas, Hezbollah)
Hezollah – Lebanon North, 10X firepower Hamas, 50k soldiers 5k elite (trained Iran), 200k rockets/guided missiles/drones = overwhelm Iron Dome (??OCT 7 #1 Neg Anniv)
https://www.the-sun.com/news/12269579/hezbollah-ready-attack-israel-tunnels/
#8. God will judge nations for how they treated Him and His people
Joel 3:2-16 And I will enter into judgment with them there, on behalf of my people and my heritage Israel, because they have scattered them among the nations and have divided up my land, and have cast lots for my people, and have traded a boy for a prostitute, and have sold a girl for wine and have drunk it. “What are you to me, O Tyre and Sidon [Lebanon/Hezbollah], and all the regions of Philistia [includes Gaza/Hamas]? Are you paying me back for something? If you are paying me back, I will return your payment on your own head swiftly and speedily. For you have taken my silver and my gold, and have carried my rich treasures into your temples. You have sold the people of Judah and Jerusalem to the Greeks in order to remove them far from their own border. Behold, I will stir them up from the place to which you have sold them, and I will return your payment on your own head. I will sell your sons and your daughters into the hand of the people of Judah, and they will sell them to the Sabeans [Yemen/Houthis], to a nation far away, for the LORD has spoken.” Proclaim this among the nations: Consecrate for war; stir up the mighty men. Let all the men of war draw near; let them come up. Beat your plowshares into swords, and your pruning hooks into spears; let the weak say, “I am a warrior.” Hasten and come, all you surrounding nations, and gather yourselves there. Bring down your warriors, O LORD. Let the nations stir themselves up and come up to the Valley of Jehoshaphat; for there I will sit to judge all the surrounding nations. Put in the sickle, for the harvest is ripe. Go in, tread, for the winepress is full. The vats overflow, for their evil is great. Multitudes, multitudes, in the valley of decision! For the day of the LORD is near in the valley of decision. The sun and the moon are darkened, and the stars withdraw their shining. The LORD roars from Zion, and utters his voice from Jerusalem, and the heavens and the earth quake.
Everyone & Everything = belongs to the Lord. Judgement & War for:
1. Scattering Jewish people (1800 yrs)
2. Abusing people – esp slavery & children (Egypt, Babylon, Rome, Germany, Antisemitism)
3. Dividing land – dividing up Promised Land
4. Stealing from God – “silver/gold”
- Worshipping false gods –
#9. God will deliver His people forever and richly bless them
Joel 3:16-21 But the LORD is a refuge to his people, a stronghold to the people of Israel. “So you shall know that I am the LORD your God, who dwells in Zion, my holy mountain. And Jerusalem shall be holy, and strangers shall never again pass through it. “And in that day the mountains shall drip sweet wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the streambeds of Judah shall flow with water; and a fountain shall come forth from the house of the LORD and water the Valley of Shittim. “Egypt shall become a desolation and Edom [Jordan] a desolate wilderness, for the violence done to the people of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land. But Judah shall be inhabited forever, and Jerusalem to all generations. I will avenge their blood, blood I have not avenged, for the LORD dwells in Zion.”
Band UP
- Kids growing up – I would tell them what was coming (trouble, trip)
- They would ask questions
- I would tell them, “just stick close to Dad and I will take care of you”
End of History
God’s people – protection, provision, presence
Not God’s people – judgment, wrath, hell forever