Revealed Duties While Awaiting Christ’s Return

Driving home: And so our Lord is saying take heed that you do not allow yourselves to get into a condition that puts you out of touch with all of these great realities that I've been setting before you.

Martin uses the analogy of a man driving home after a business trip, fighting off sleep to reach his family, to illustrate 'wakefulness' as actively driving sleep away and maintaining a state of alertness.

And I use the word wakefulness instead of watchfulness because later on we're going to come across several usages of the word watch and it is a different word. Now though there are contexts where the two words are used basically as synonyms, in this context it would appear that the shade of difference in meaning is deliberate. This particular word is a compound word which comes from two words which mean to chase sleep. And it's the picture of what a man does who's been away on a business trip.

23:24 - 24:00 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And so our Lord is saying take heed that you do not allow yourselves to get into a condition that puts you out of touch with all of these great realities that I've been setting before you.

The example of a soldier pulling a horrible watch, knowing he'd be shot if found asleep, illustrates the intense, marshalling of faculties required for spiritual wakefulness.

You must do as the man driving that car when his eyelids try to go south. You must do whatever you must do to keep yourself in a state of wakefulness. What the soldier must do when he's pulled that horrible watch from perhaps 3 a.m. to 6 a.m.

25:24 - 25:45 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And so our Lord is saying take heed that you do not allow yourselves to get into a condition that puts you out of touch with all of these great realities that I've been setting before you.

Martin uses the analogy of sleep's power to cut a man off from his real-world problems (unpaid bills, nagging wife, unappreciative kids) to explain how spiritual slumber disconnects believers from the great realities of Christ's return.

Why? Well, for the simple reason that under the imagery of wakefulness as opposed to sleepiness which is constantly in the picture when it comes to the second coming you see, sleep among other things has the wonderful power of cutting us off totally from the world of reality in which we're living. A man may have a string of unpaid jobs as long as his arm. He may have a nagging, oppressive, ugly wife and a bunch of kids that don't appreciate him and he may have all kinds of problems pressing in upon him but the moment he drifts off into sleep he is consciously separated from all those problems....

26:21 - 27:18 Read in full sermon

Driving home: And in the exhortations pertaining to the second coming, sleeping is an evil thing.

Martin vividly describes the shame and disgust a gatekeeper would feel if his master, having solemnly charged him to watch, returned unexpectedly to find him sound asleep, illustrating the spiritual shame of being unprepared for Christ's return.

And then taking the Roman way of reckoning the night segment, which was the segment of a 24-hour period that we would call night, the Hebrews broke it up into three, the Romans into four, and with this gospel targeted for the Romans, it is broken up into the Roman reckoning, whether at even, midnight, cock-crowing, or in the morning, there is a sign of the indefiniteness, the hiddenness of the time, and then this horrible possibility, lest, coming suddenly, coming unexpectedly, he find you sleeping. Can you imagine what it would be like? Here is a man who pledges his loyalty to the householder...

39:57 - 41:25 Read in full sermon

The point: Your duties and my duties are clearly set forth by our Lord. We are to take heed. We are to be concerned that we keep wakeful and prayerful. We are to continually maintain this intense spiritual watchfulness, keeping in …

Martin quotes Edersheim's eloquent description of the church's 'peculiar attitude' of loyal expectation, with loins girt for work and heart full of loving expectancy, sustained by the undetermined time of Christ's return.

but it will make it to be to us what it is to every healthy soul, the blessed hope of the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ. The spirit which should mark the people of God in every generation is that of loyal expectation of the absent one who is sure to return. Edershine, in commenting on the Olivet Discourse, wrote several sentences that I found so moving that I felt I should read them to you, and I want to read them to you before coming to my concluding application. Hear, Edershine, the peculiar attitude of the church with loins girt for work since the time was...

47:49 - 49:14 Read in full sermon

The point: You must give your energies to that which Christ says they ought to be given to. And you must give your energies to the nurturing of your heart. The keeping of your heart.

Martin references his esteemed Puritan forefathers who thought they would set up the new Canaan in America, using this as an example of a view that contradicts the New Testament's description of the inter-advental period.

I listen to the apostles and not Rushduni. I listen to the apostles and not Greg Bonson. And I listen to the apostles and not some of my esteemed Puritan forefathers who thought they were going to set up the new Canaan here in America. In America.

57:19 - 57:35 Read in full sermon

The point: You must give your energies to that which Christ says they ought to be given to. And you must give your energies to the nurturing of your heart. The keeping of your heart.

Martin uses the hypothetical example of 50% of Montville's population converting to illustrate that even a significant revival would still leave Christians as a minority, reinforcing the idea that the gospel will not be a popular majority.

If God were to save fifty percent of the population of Montville in the next week, we'd still be the minority, my friends. Twenty million, twenty-five million people in a thirty-five mile radius in this area. May God save the tens and the twenties and the thirties and the hundreds. But the gospel's never going to be the popular majority.

59:09 - 59:32 Read in full sermon

The point: What does watchfulness mean for you? Is there any legitimate application of this great call to watchfulness that comes to you?

Martin uses the days of Noah, where people were preoccupied with normal life (eating, drinking, marrying) until the flood came suddenly, to illustrate how Christ's return will come unexpectedly upon those unprepared.

But of that day and hour knoweth no one, not even the angels of heaven, neither the Son, but the Father only. And as were the days of Noah, so shall be the coming of the Son of Man. What marked the days of Noah? Great signs of a coming flood?

60:52 - 61:10 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin addresses unbelievers, using Matthew 24's parallel passage and the days of Noah to illustrate the suddenness of Christ's coming. He warns against preoccupation with…

Martin recounts the mockers in Peter's day who scoffed at the promise of Christ's coming, saying 'Everything's going on as it always has,' to highlight the historical and ongoing temptation to dismiss the certainty of the Lord's return.

It was a stumbling block in Peter's day. The mockers were going around saying, ha, ha, ha. Talk about his coming. Everything's going on.

62:53 - 63:01 Read in full sermon