This is Living Waters of Grace, the teaching ministry of Clark
Waffer, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Westmoreland, County
of Greensburg, PA. Now here's Pastor Clark as he
continues teaching through God's Word.
The good news is, is that when you think about the heartache
and the despair and the deception in the world today,
you can get hopeless. You can become overwhelmed and
discouraged and say, what in the world can I do?
Well, you and I can't do anything, but Christ can do a
lot through you and me. Simple people.
Just take that gospel and give it to people.
When God gives you an opportunity, pray for your kids,
pray for your loved ones. Don't give up, don't get
discouraged. Your prayers carry more weight
than anything you can imagine. Boy, I'll tell you, when you
look around at the world, there's a lot of wickedness that
goes on. It seems like people's hearts
are hardened and evil prevails. Shootings, bombing, senseless
murders, all kinds of flagrant sexuality just thrown in our
faces daily. In today's message, Pastor Clark
encourages you to not lose heart.
God is still on the throne and the gospel is still the power of
God unto salvation for all who believe.
Keep sharing Jesus with people. Keep praying for your loved ones
who are lost now. Here's Pastor Clark in
Revelation chapter 14 with today's edition of Living Waters
of Grace. Now the Bible describes us as
fornication in verse 8. This idea of fornication, we all
know what it means literally in in in the fallen state of our
our humanity. Unfortunately, some of us were
involved in those things at what the one time.
But the good news is I love what Paul says, but such for some of
you. But you were washed, you're
sanctified, you're justified. I mean, the blood cleanses us
from all of our sin. And so we don't carry the guilt.
Nonetheless, we don't point the fingers at others who are stuck
in those sins thinking we're better.
We show forth the love of Christ and tell them about a savior.
But the apostles referring to a spiritual fornication.
And it's the idea of worshipping false gods, people who are
worshipping Buddha and Allah, Muhammad, Krishna, all these
false ideologies today that are out there that people are
wrapped up in. It's having a spiritual
connection with something that is not real and is not true.
And so the judgement upon these people at this time for
worshipping these things, the third Angel warns of this coming
judgement in verse 9 through 11. And it says that they will be
tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the
holy angels in the presence of the Lamb.
It says in verse 11, the smoke of their torment ascends forever
and ever and they have no rest day and night.
Who worship the beast in his image and whoever receives the
mark of his name. I'll tell you guys, I, I don't
like thinking about this stuff, the horror of hell for people
that we walk by every day that we know that maybe we haven't
had the courage yet to tell them about what Jesus has done for
us. We haven't given him Full
disclosure about, hey, you know, I'm not telling you this because
I'm perfect and I'm better than you, but I'm telling you this
because Christ died for me and saved me and has forgiven me of
my sins that you need a savior too.
And if you don't have a savior, the consequences that are going
to fall upon you in your life one day are going to be without
end torment forever and ever and ever.
I'll tell you, I don't think our hearts, as Rick prayed this
morning are are broken enough. And and I don't mean we're
walking around in South class and ash type attitudes, but it's
just like we have this vulnerability and this love in
our hearts that we want everybody to get saved.
That's really what we should be like, right?
We should have this great desire to this love on people and see
them come to know the Lord that has revealed himself to us.
But the judgement upon these people are are it's without end.
And as the result of their deception, it's going to be,
it's going to be a lot of pressure on the earth at this
time because we have to do commerce.
People still have to buy and sell.
People still have to make decisions financially.
And it's going to come a type of government that's going to make
it very, very difficult, impossible really for us who are
believers. Of course, I don't believe we'll
be here. We'll be raptured out prior to a
lot of this stuff coming into full bloom.
But nonetheless, those who are left behind that come to know
Christ at this time will have to make a decision to refuse to
accept the mark of the beast. And as a result, they're going
to be martyred. They're going to be put in
internment camps, concentration camps, much like the Jews had to
go through during the Holocaust. And they won't be able to live
in this world anymore because the Antichrist will have full
control. It was almost like what happened
in the early days of the church where the people were commanded
by Caesar to take a pinch of incense and throw it at the idol
of the person of Caesar, pledging allegiance to him.
And those who pledge allegiance to the Antichrist, as it says in
verse 10, are forced to drink of the wine of the wrath of God,
the cup of wrath. Those under judgment will be
forced to drink this. This is expressed many times in
in the Scriptures Psalm 75, eight it says, for in the hand
of the Lord there is a cup and the wine is red.
It is fully mixed and he pours it out.
Surely it's dregs show all the wicked of the earth drain and
drink down Jeremiah 2515. For thus says the Lord God of
Israel to me, take the wine cup of fury from my hand, and cause
all the nations to whom I send you to drink it again.
The fulfillment of these very things that were written
thousands of years before by the psalmist and the prophet
Jeremiah talking about things and I'm sure at times they
couldn't really grasp and put their minds fully around.
And now the apostle John is clearly defining to us what will
come to pass. And then Jesus himself in
Matthew 2639, he says, if it is possible, let this cup pass by
me. He had to drink that cup of
God's wrath for you and me. He had to take upon himself the
anger and the wrath of his Father for the sins of you and
me. And Jesus willingly took the cup
of God's wrath that you and I deserve.
In verse 10 here we see the enemies of Jesus.
They, they have a choice, but basically they have no choice
because they're going to be forced to drink this cup.
It's going to be forced upon them, this cup of indignation.
And this anger comes from a God who's settled.
You know, sometimes they think of God, what's his, what's his
temperament like? Is he really happy one day and
joyful and blissful and loving and another day he's like really
mad and angry, you know, is he erratic in his personality like
we are so often does he does his temperament move with the tides
of seasons or the opinions of people Know this comes from a
settled disposition of this God's character.
And I couldn't even begin to explain to you the magnificence
of God's character, the perfection of God's character.
But there's a couple Greek words that help us to understand this
indignation of this anger that comes from this holy God.
The first word is orge, and it's the common word that is used for
anger in the New Testament, used many, many times.
But this particular word here in this rendering in the in the
Book of Revelation comes from the word thymos.
It means it's a passionate anger and it's used only 11 times and
10 times it's used in the Book of Revelation.
So the the anger of God is just, I wouldn't say it's seething or
it's in the background. It's just present because he's
holy and without holiness. There can not be a separation
between vindication and justice, right?
And anger. But it comes from a calm throne
of God as he is completely in control, as we sang about.
And the clear teachings here is sometimes you run into people,
especially in these last days. Well, I really don't think
there's a hell. You know, a lot of churches,
unfortunately, are moving away from the message of hell.
Hell isn't a good thing to talk about, they say in churches on
Sunday because it offends people.
Who makes them uncomfortable? I mean, it's crazy.
You know, it's just like, what are we supposed to do?
Like RIP out pages of the Bible and say, well, this is
acceptable because this will make people happy, but this
won't. And, you know, now, if you're
saved, you don't have anything to worry about.
You're not going there. But if you're unsaved today and
you're lost, you would have some concern.
I would hope today that you don't want to end up in this
place where there's this eternal punishment and destiny waiting.
Those who love sin and hate God, they're tormented with fire and
brimstone. The scriptures declare here,
tormenting them forever and ever.
The word brimstone is actually in the the Bible.
They talk about these people long ago who were out in the
street corners. They would call them fanatics
because they were telling people about fire and brimstone.
What's real? It's true, and it awaits those
who don't have a Savior in the presence of His holy angels.
This is all being seen in the presence of the Lamb, and God
will not be absent from hell. Some people describe hell.
Yes, the fire. What's the fire?
Well, the fire may be the holiness of God.
That this burns everything away that isn't righteous.
And the only way we'll be able to stand in the midst of God's
holiness is because of the righteousness of Christ.
He's our protection. He's our shield.
But if you're without a savior, that, that brightness and that,
that fire of God's holiness will burn your soul forever and ever
and ever. You, you can't hide from it.
You can't cover your eyes, you know, because the brightness is
all exceeding and it just goes through the, the entire being of
the, of the human heart. And, and there's no place to
run, no place to hide in this life.
Now it says men love darkness rather than light because their
deeds are evil right now. They think they can get away
from the light, but one day they won't be able to flee from the
light. And it says the smoke of their
torment will send forever and ever and ever eternal hell.
And so why do we preach the gospel?
Why is it so important to preach the gospel?
Second, Peter 29 says the Lord is not slack concerning his
promise, as some count slackness.
We're slackers, aren't we? We all are.
We don't want to be slackers, but we are slackers.
But you know, we say God work on my heart so I'm less a slacker
and that I actually am interested in telling some
people about what you've revealed to me.
That's like how you get away from being a slacker.
You begin to do what he would do if he was walking here today
still, but this is the Lord. He's long-suffering toward us
means he's so patient and so loving.
He's not willing that any should perish, but that all should come
to repentance. He doesn't want anybody to have
to suffer this torment. He loves the whole world.
That's why he gave his only begotten Son.
He doesn't want anybody to have to experience this horror.
John chapter 317, the gospel John says for God did not send
his Son into the world to condemn the world, right, but
that the world through him might be saved.
What a God, a God of love who doesn't condemn us, but there
will be that day when it's too late.
And that's why we preach the gospel.
And it says in verse 12 and 13 regarding those who stood for
the Lord and suffered martyrdom and suffering because they
wouldn't receive the mark of the beast.
It says, he hears a voice from heaven saying to me, blessed are
the dead who die in the Lord from now on, yes.
The Spirit says that they may rest from their laborers and
their works follow them. These people endured patiently
and faithfully. They stood the test regardless
of the consequences and what encouragement that should be for
all of us. I don't believe we're going to
maybe sense this kind of martyrdom.
At least I pray we don't. Our kids, our grandkids, our
great grandkids. I just pray the Lord comes back
soon. I really do.
That's the only answer. But when you're standing in your
life to be faithful, when people persecute you, when they
ridicule you, when they laugh at you, when situations don't work
out the way you were praying and they say, where's your God?
Or you're in a situation where someone, you know, maybe he's
listening for a while and, and, and all of a sudden you know
you're offended because of how they responded to you or how
they rejected you. The Lord encourages us in First
Corinthians 1558 for you and me as well.
Be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in your work for the
Lord. Don't give up, don't get weary
and well doing, always abounding in your work for the Lord, for
as much as you know your labour is not in vain in the Lord.
That's my life verse, my favorite verse, as a matter what
I see in my life, in my ministry, or what happens or
what doesn't happen happen, and none of that stuff's important.
All I want to do is just keep being faithful to what I believe
God called me to do. I want you guys to be faithful
to what God's called you to do. Don't worry about the results.
Don't worry about the success. Don't worry about what you see
being answered or the prayers that you want to be answered
that you never see answered. Just keep your nose focused, as
Paul said, toward Christ, keeping your eyes on him.
Be steadfast and movable, always abounding in your work for the
Lord. I love this last part.
For as much as you know, your labor is not in vain in the
Lord, If you have a spouse who's struggling, don't get
discouraged. Just keep praying.
Pray for their soul. Pray for your kids.
Pray for your neighbors and your loved ones, your wayward family
members. Don't give up.
Just keep praying and keep praying and always abounding,
being steadfast and movable. Your work, your labor is not in
vain in the Lord. Regardless of what happens, God
will credit these things to your account in the coming Kingdom.
14 through 16. It talks about the reaping and I
read the verses from Matthew regarding the the tares and the
wheat. And this is a time when Jesus
will bring in the harvest. It refers to him in verse 14.
He's the one that sits on the cloud, one like the Son of Man,
having on his head a golden crown and in his hand a sharp
sickle. He's going to come out and begin
to reap for it says a harvest of the earth and 15 is ripe and
he's ready to come and deal with the lies and the false
professions and those who claim to be something they're not
because he, he knows everything we can't see that He knows he'll
come and he'll reap and he's coming not in this rush.
He's waited how many years now that the world has been in
existence over 6000, right? That's what some people claim.
I'm not a a scientist, so I, I, I don't understand all the
carbon data readings and all that, but I know that this earth
is not super old and yet God says a day with him is like 1000
years and 1000 years is like a day.
So regardless of how old the earth is, if you want to call it
the 20,000 years, that's 20 days.
That's not a long time from God's perspective.
But he comes patiently not rushing into judgement and he's
harvesting the evil. He's gathering and binding and
burning up the tares as he promised he would do prior to
the return of his son on the earth, this reign and roll.
He talks about the winepress in 17 through 20, and the Angel
comes out and it's interesting. These angels are coming out of a
temple and in heaven there will be this temple.
It gives very descriptive. We'll get into that in the in
the latter chapters, what it's going to look like, but there'll
be this place of worship, God's holy temple, and this is where
God does his bidding and he sends out his ambassadors to
finish and complete the job prior to his millennial Kingdom.
This one Angel comes out who had power over fire.
He crows with a loud cry to him who had the sharp sickle,
saying, Thrust in your sharp sickle and gather the clusters
of the vines of the earth, for her grapes are fully ripe.
And the Angel thrusts the sickle into the earth and gathers the
vine of the earth and throws it into the great wine press for
the wrath of God. The carnage of judgment, and the
last day beneath the omnipotent hand and power of God will be
like no other war or conflict that the world has ever known.
The battle of Armageddon, prior to the return of Jesus Christ,
his second coming, will be referred to as World War Three.
And the blood will be so spread around that it'll be splattered
up upon the horse's bridal. It says in verse 20, it's quite
graphic. The blood came of the winepress
up to the horse's bridles for 1600 furlongs.
We see this area within the city of Jerusalem, approximately 200
mile radius, the valley of Megiddo, where this final
conflict will take place. It's going to be a gathering
time together of this final battle prior to Christ's second
coming and chapter 14 clearly depicts for us today the Lord
God is a triumphant 1 all powerful and he's in control.
God, the Messiah, God watching out for his elect, his bride,
his church continually throughout the ages.
So as we look at these horrendous things that are going
to come upon the earth. What do you what do you think
about when you when you hear these things?
I mean, it's just like not another study and another
Sunday. I I believe every time we go
through the scriptures and, and when God has us here personally,
there's this accountability that all of us have because we hear
things that we're responsible for, right?
All of us. The Bible declares that to him
is given much light. Much is required.
And the benefit of going through the Scriptures like this is that
none of us are in the darkness. We're all in the light today,
and that's a good thing. And so there is someone in your
life, someone somewhere that God wants to use to bring them to a
saving knowledge of his, of his Son, Jesus Christ.
And then those who are in backslidden conditions, and I've
been there. We've all been there at times
when we haven't been as zealous for God for some reason, we get
out of the Word, we stop praying, we get too busy with
other things, right? And all of a sudden we find that
we're not really connecting with the Lord, right?
Have you ever prayed in a time of need and you feel like God's
1,000,000 miles away and you're like, Lord, I just want to hang
out with you and what you do. I haven't heard from you for
like 3 years, you know? You know, all of a sudden you
want to like have this close relationship again.
Yeah, Lord, I really do. And God is so good.
I mean, to us, he doesn't make us jump through a million hoops.
If he truly sees our repentant heart, He runs at us like the
prodigal, right? Because we all are prodigals.
But the good news is, is that when you think about the
heartache and the despair and the deception in the world
today, you can get hopeless. You can become overwhelmed and
discouraged and say, what in the world can I do?
Well, you and I can't do anything but Christ.
Can do a lot through you and me. Simple people.
Just take that gospel and give it to people when God gives you
an opportunity. Pray for your kids, pray for
your loved ones. Don't give up, don't get
discouraged. Your prayers carry more weight
than anything you can imagine. If you could see what was
happening in the throne room of God when your prayers are being
sent up to him as a sweet smelling savor, an aroma to his
nostrils, he immediately listens and responds and takes it in and
he's active. He's active even before we begin
to pray because he knows what's upon our hearts, whether it's
situations of family and marriage and kids and and health
issues or every area God is involved in.
And one of the things he spoke to me about in closing when
Cindy and I were away in this retreat last week.
Sometimes I think, boy, it's great.
Get away, brain drain, not think anything.
God doesn't let that happen with me.
He says, Clark, we got some business to do here.
I said what? I want to show you some things
in your heart. Oh, God, you're kidding me.
I don't. I don't know.
Well, you're going to see it, Clark.
OK, Lord. And Cindy and I just had a time
of praying and and being open before the Lord and with each
other. And he was showing me things on
my heart. He was showing me how easy it is
to be discontent. The horrible sin of
discontentment is a horrible thing.
Paul said to be content in whatever state you find yourself
in. And you know, when you're
discontent, you're aggravated. You're disappointed because
things aren't working out the way you'd like them to work out,
right? And so you're despondent and
you're despairing and you're unbelieving and you're hopeless
and you're faithless. And the devil loves to fish in
that water. He did.
Hey, man, that's such a right where I want that guy.
I'm going to really take him down the drain here.
We got to just right away say, Lord, it's wrong.
I'm to be rejoicing in the Lord in all things, give thanks in
all things, Amen, for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus
concerning you. Paul said godliness with
contentment is great gain. And so, you know, he said to me,
Clark, start making a list of things that you can know for
sure that I have done that you can be thankful for.
Focus on my mercies that are new day by day.
And he's given me more mercies than I deserve.
I don't deserve one mercy. I don't know about you, but he's
given me a boatload of mercies and I need to focus on the
goodness of the Lord, Amen, and the land of the living.
So that was one thing he really clarified to me.
And he also told me that whenever I'm discontent, that's
what breeds fear and anxiety. What if this happens?
What if that happened? What do I do about this?
What? I.
And your whole mind is like, totally messed up, right?
Anybody ever been there? Yeah.
Maybe some of you are here today.
I don't know. But you know, we just come and
say, Lord, I I see this clearly as you are showing it to me.
And you don't want me to walk around like this.
Sorry. I repent about.
I give it to you. I lay it at your feet and I want
to rejoice in the Lord. I want to rejoice in the Lord
forevermore. I'd like to tell you that that's
a done deal for me and no more problems.
It's not that way. This is something you said
you'll be working on till the day you meet me in the Kingdom.
But I'll remind you when it's surfacing again, when you're not
content, when you're living in anxiety and fear and
hopelessness and desperation. I'm going to remind you to come
back to me and trust in the Lord with all your heart, right?
Not leaning into your own understanding and all your ways
acknowledge Him. He's not a liar, is he?
And all your ways acknowledge Him, and He shall direct our
path. In the Book of Revelation,
Pastor Clark is taking us through all kinds of events and
happenings that are predicted for the future.
But for those who believe and follow Jesus, there's much to
look forward to in heaven with Jesus.
However, for those who are here on earth during the Tribulation,
there's all kinds of chaos that will unfold.
The Bible talks about an Antichrist, a false prophet, and
of course, that evil enemy, Satan.
Do you see how there are such clever attempts for the enemy to
disguise himself as God and even the Trinity?
The true Savior of the world is God and how he comes to rescue
through his triune nature God the Father, Jesus the Son, and
God the Holy Spirit. Just like Satan tried to take
over for God in heaven and was cast out, Satan will try to
convince people on earth that he is the Triune God to be
worshipped instead of the legitimate God in heaven.
It's an attempt, and although he will capture plenty in his
schemes, he will not win. The true God wins, and
Revelation unpacks how that will all happen in detail.
Be encouraged because there's a way out for all of this madness
that will ensue on this earth. But you don't want to wait
indefinitely to make that decision about Jesus.
We don't know when the church will be raptured, and you want
to be ready to be with Jesus. To learn more about this, head
over to calvarychapelonline.com. We're so glad you've been with
us today. And if you'd like to connect
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Be sure to join us for weekly services at 400 E Pittsburgh St.
Ste. 6B in Greensburg, PA 15601. This has been living waters of
grace.