Deepen and strengthen your relationship with Jesus. 

Hartland Summer Campmeeting 2017: Abiding in Christ

<p>Deepen and strengthen your relationship with Jesus. </p>

<p>Free sharing permitted under the Creative Commons <a rel="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/us/">BY-NC-ND 3.0 (US)</a> license.</p>

Hartland Institute of Health and Education

Stephen Bohr

The Sin of Omission

Father in heaven, we come before your throne, your awesome throne this morning.

First of all, to express our thankfulness, our gratefulness for giving us life this day.

Not only life, but so many blessings that you have poured out upon us.

What an awesome God you are, a creator, Redeemer, and soon we will live with you forever.

And Father this morning as we open a portion of your word to study how we can better prepare for that day, we ask for the presence of your Holy Spirit through the ministry of your angels.

We know that you inspired scripture and only you can explain it to us.

So we plead for your presence and we ask that you will instruct us this morning and you will empower us to live in harmony with what we study.

We pray this in the precious name of Jesus.

I'd like to invite you to turn in your Bibles with me to Matthew chapter 25.

Matthew chapter 25 and we are going to read a rather extensive passage in this chapter, verses 31 through 46.

And let's play pay close attention to the details that we find in this parable of Jesus.

When the Son of Man comes in His glory and all the holy angels with Him, then he will sit on the throne of his glory.

All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate them 1 from another, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats, and he will set the sheep on his right hand, but the goats on the left.

Then the king will say to those on his right hand, Come you blessed of my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

I was a stranger and you took me in, I was 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 you a stranger and take you in, or naked and clothe you?

Or when did we see you sick or in prison and come to you?

And the king will answer and say to them, Assuredly I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to 1 of the least of these my brethren, you did it to me.

Then he will also say to those on the left hand, depart from me, you cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels.

For I was hungry and you gave me no food.

I was a stranger and you did not take me in.

Sick and in prison and you did not visit me.

Then they also will answer him saying, Lord when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison and did not minister to you?

Then he will answer them, saying, Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did not do it to 1 of the least of these, you did not do it to me.

And these will go away into everlasting punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.

So do you have this parable clear in your mind?

Now we want to ask 3 questions about this passage.

Number 1, to whom did Jesus direct this teaching?

Was it to believers or was it to unbelievers?

You already gave the answer, you're right.

When and where does this judgment take place?

And the final question is what is the criterion that is used in this judgment to determine who will be saved and who will be lost?

Let's attempt to answer our first question.

It's very clear that this parable is addressed to believers, to people who claim to have received Jesus as Savior and Lord, and we know this because of the context.

You see in Matthew chapter 24 as we all know we have the signs of the second coming of Jesus, we have a series of signs that are presented in Matthew 24.

At the end of chapter 24 Jesus tells a parable, the parable of the good and faithful servant.

Obviously if it's a good and faithful servant he is a follower of Christ, But there's also 1 who is unfaithful and not so good, he also claims to be a follower of Christ in this parable at the end of Matthew 24.

Then in chapter 25 we have 3 parables and all 3 of these parables are addressed to believers and the parables have to do with preparing for the coming of the Lord.

Did the foolish virgins claim to be followers of Jesus?

They also claimed to be followers of the Lord.

God gives talents to all of His servants.

The 1 who received 10, 5 multiplies them, the 1 who received 2 multiplies them, the 1 that received 1 does not multiply the 1, but returns it to the master.

All of those who receive talents are individuals who claimed to be followers of the Lord.

And then you have this last parable in Matthew Chapter 25 where you have the separation of the sheep and the goats, both groups claim to be followers of Jesus.

So clearly the context, the parables that come after the signs of the second coming, clearly they are indicating that this teaching in Matthew Chapter 25, 31 to 46 applies to believers, It's a warning for believers.

Now we need to also answer the question when will this judgment scene take place?

We know now that this passage is addressed not to atheists, not to unbelievers, not to people who never claimed Jesus Christ, it's addressed to individuals who claim to be followers of Jesus.

But the question is when does this judgment scene take place?

At what point in human history does this take place?

Clue number 1, Jesus is sitting on His own throne, the throne of His glory, and He comes in His glory.

At the second coming He comes in the glory of His Father, but here He is coming in His own glory and He's sitting on His own throne.

By the way that's important because when Jesus went to heaven He sat with His Father on His Father's throne, but here Jesus is sitting on His own throne.

Another clue is that at this point all nations from human history are gathered before the throne, which means that people from all nations must be alive at that point, which means that they must have the dead among those nations must have resurrected.

You'll notice also that there's an examination of the evidence in this judgment, also a verdict is given after the examination of the evidence in the judgment.

And then the verdict is executed and the execution takes place in the lake of fire.

And it's interesting at the end of this parable, we are told that this lake of fire has been prepared for the devil and his angels, an event that does not take place at the second coming but takes place after the millennium.

So basically the time frame of this parable is something that is happening after the millennium, after the thousand years, Because there's a white throne, Jesus is sitting alone on His throne, all nations are gathered there before the throne, there's an examination of the evidence, there is a verdict given, the execution takes place in the lake of fire, and the devil and his angels are thrown into the fire, that is after the millennium.

Now in the book of Revelation we have a similar passage, That passage is found in Revelation Chapter 20.

There we also find a great white throne upon which Jesus sits.

I want to read from Great Controversy page 665.

This is in the chapter The Controversy Ended which is dealing with events after the millennium.

Ellen White describes Jesus sitting on a white throne above the holy city on His own throne.

It says there, Far above the city upon a foundation of burnished gold is a throne high and lifted up.

And upon this throne sits the Son of God, and around him are the subjects of his kingdom.

So the Son of God is sitting on the throne of His glory on His own throne.

Now in Revelation 20 are all nations gathered before that throne?

Yes, very clearly it says he goes to Gog and Magog and gathers all of the nations from all of human history before that throne.

Is there an examination of the evidence there in Chapter 20?

Yes, it says that the books are opened and everyone is judged according to what is found written in the books.

So there is an examination of the evidence just like we are told in Matthew.

Yes whoever was not found in the book of life, the Bible says they are cast where?

Into the lake of fire, and who is cast into the lake of fire with them, the devil and his angels.

So the scene that we have in Matthew and the scene that we have in Revelation 20 is the same scene.

However, there is a significant difference between the scene in Matthew and the scene in the book of Revelation.

If you examine first of all the judgment scene in Revelation we're going to discover that the reason why the wicked are excluded from the city and eventually are cast into the lake of fire is because they broke the commandments of God.

We might say that in their lives they practiced the sin of commission, they committed sins.

In other words you say where does Revelation say that?

Let's go to 3 passages at the end of Revelation.

The Sin of Omission

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