Longing for His Return, Part 1

In this part of the sermon: Martin begins by reading the accounts of Jesus' ascension from Acts 1 and Luke 24, emphasizing the apostles' eyewitness experience and the angels' clear prophecy that Jesus would…

Martin compares Jesus' slow, visible ascension to a slow-moving elevator, emphasizing that it was not a sudden disappearance but a deliberate, observable event for the apostles.

And our Lord responds with a final statement concerning the coming of the Holy Spirit and the subsequent divine program for world-wide witness. And then, according to the supplemental material found in Luke's Gospel, in chapter 24, verses 50 and 51, our Lord takes this company out with him to the Mount of Olives, Acts 1, 12, a place near Bethany. Then he raises his hands in priestly blessing. And as he begins to bless them, perhaps using the very Aaronic blessing that they had heard many times in their life experience, that blessing recorded in the word of God, to be pronounced by the priest a...

7:13 - 8:34 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Expounding 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, Martin argues that eagerly awaiting Christ's return is one of three summarizing characteristics of genuine conversion, alongside turning from…

He contrasts the eager waiting for Christ with the frustrated, irritated waiting in a dentist's office, highlighting that the biblical 'waiting' implies joyful anticipation, not dread or impatience.

Not the kind of waiting you do in the dentist's office. You've got an appointment for two o'clock, you're in there at five till two, and another patient is there, overlaps a little bit. You're waiting, but you sure ain't waiting with eager expectation. You're waiting, but you sure ain't waiting with eager expectation.

39:55 - 40:08 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Expounding 1 Thessalonians 1:9-10, Martin argues that eagerly awaiting Christ's return is one of three summarizing characteristics of genuine conversion, alongside turning from…

Martin uses the illustration of a beloved wife eagerly awaiting her husband's ship returning from World War II to convey the deep longing and anticipation that characterizes the Christian's waiting for Christ.

None of us waits in the dentist's office, unless you've got such a wretched, horrible toothache that anything's worth getting rid of the toothache. But generally speaking, it's not that kind of waiting. It's not the kind of waiting in which we're frustrated and irritated that someone's not on time. It's the eager expectation and waiting of the beloved wife who kissed her husband goodbye when he went off on a ship To go off to fight in the Second World War.

40:13 - 40:42 Read in full sermon

Driving home: God never takes a man's person. To heaven. But that he first of all takes his heart to heaven.

He quotes an old Puritan saying that God never takes a man's person to heaven without first taking his heart to heaven, illustrating the reorientation of affections that accompanies true conversion.

Their hearts have been taken to the place where they will eventually go. And as one of the old Puritans says. God never takes a man's person. To heaven.

43:25 - 43:37 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Grace always comes offering salvation, not in sin, but from sin.

Martin uses the example of a sober man accurately perceiving the sides of an octagon on a pulpit, contrasting it with someone affected by alcohol seeing 'pink elephants,' to explain that 'soberly' means being in touch with reality, especially spiritual reality.

In this present age in which there is so little sobriety. People live as though they're going to live forever. They're not in touch with reality. A sober man is a man whose brain is not affected by overload of alcohol, causing him to see pink elephants.

61:37 - 61:56 Read in full sermon