Text; Rom. 13:11-14
Title: Christians awakening
If you were here Sunday night you heard Pastor Lang preach on soul winning. He pointed out that the field is now ripe unto harvest. I want to expand on that somewhat and give another reason why it is imperative that we be busy in the Lord’s harvest. We don’t know how much time we have left to do anything that we can do. God has set His church as the only method of soul winning, there is no plan B.
My message tonight is about why the churches are so lax in soul winning. I have titled it Christians Awakening.
Rom.13:11-14 And that, knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep: for now is our salvation nearer than when we believed. 12 The night is far spent, the day is at hand: let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. 13 Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. 14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh, to fulfil the lusts thereof.
I want to speak this evening about three things associated with this text;
1. The times we are living in;
2. The sleeping church;
3. The awaking of the church.
First I want to speak to you this evening about what the Bible says about the times we live in. Our scripture says in vv. 11-12 “ And knowing the time that now it is high time to wake out of sleep.”
Our scripture text says that “Now it is high time to wake out of sleep, now is our salvation nearer than when we believed.
Do we truly know the times we live in? Do we really know that now it is high time to wake out of sleep?
It is obvious that the Apostle Paul felt some in this church at Rome had fallen asleep concerning their spiritual lives.
I want to draw your attention first to the words in our scripture that says And knowing the time that now it is high time to wake out of sleep. “For now is our salvation nearer that when we first believed.”
My first point is knowing the times we live in. and we will look at the times both in a spiritual sense and in a prophetical sense.
I Spiritually.
1. We are living in times like Noah’s day.
Matt.24:37-38 “ But as the days of Noe were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. 38 For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark, 39 And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”
Life was going on as usual, nothing much was different. Oh, the man Noah was going around preaching that something he called a flood was coming but they didn’t believe him, it had never even rained before, besides he was a crazy man building this gigantic boat thing miles away from water.
Did they know there was a flood on its way? Well, they heard the preaching of Noah for 120 years, but they had never seen rain. They couldn’t believe what they didn’t understand. Today many unsaved people hear others talk about the rapture and judgment but they don’t understand it. The people in Noah’s day were too interested in their carnal life, just like today they had heard with their ears but not with their hearts. They did not want to believe or know. They would rather stick their heads in the sand.
-Gen. 6:5 “And GOD saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”
[a] A time of great wickedness.
-A time of corruption and violence [Gen.6:11]. The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth.
We are becoming a more violent and corrupt world. We are seeing more and more violence in our cities. Indianapolis Indiana broke its record for homicides last year. Chicago, Ill. reported more violent crimes and homicides than any other city in America. Think of all the domestic violence happening in our families. Think of the street violence. Think of all the violence committed against innocent victims.
One of our own ladies of the church was robbed and hit in the head with a gun. The young lady that was just saved is a victim of domestic abuse.
We are seeing more violence in our streets and they call it protesting. We are seeing more violence in our world. There are wars and rumors of wars throughout the world. Nation is rising against nation and kingdom against kingdom. The rise of Isis has shown how violent man’s heart can grow.
Corruption in every aspect of our communities and government is growing all the time. Politics are becoming more like potty-tics. Right here in Muncie, there is a public official under indictment for corruption.
-We are living in the times of illicit drugs usage and promiscuous sex. Rev. 9:21 “Neither repented they of their murders, not of their sorceries [pharmikia, drugs] not of their fornication nor of their thefts.” Homicides, illegal drug usage and sexual sins, does that sound familiar?
-We are living in a time of pornography. Dr. David Jeremiah in his book titled Is This The End? Reports that in the month of Jan.2016 the internet’s largest online porn site released its annual statistics. On just one website in just one year there were 4,392, 486,580 hours spent watching porn. That is close to 4.5 billion, not thousand, not million but billion hours of people watching internet porn. That equals to more than 500,000 years of porn watching. Over one-fourth of that involved child porn. That alone is over 1 billion hours watching child porn. People are constantly attempting to steal identities. There are ever evolving ways to try to steal what does not belong to them. New technology has given criminal minds and those that are corrupt and evil thinking continually find new ways of accomplishing their goals.
Truly we are living in the days like in Noah’s time.
2 We are living in times of sleeping Christians.
Not only are we living in days like Noah’s day but we are living in times of sleeping Christians.
Vs.11 “Now it is high time to awake out of sleep.”
The bible speaks of three types of sleep;
-Our natural sleep. That which we all need to replenish our bodies.
-Sleep in death. The body sleeps in the grave while the soul and/or spirit lives eternity in whatever place they have decided for themselves before dying.
- Then there is the spiritual sleep. This is what I want t o talk about.
Matt.13:25 “While men slept.” Jesus had just finished telling a parable of a sower that sowed seed into various types of soil. Some of the soil was sowed by the wayside, some in stony places, some in shallow soil and some in good soil. He now was telling them a follow up parable about a farmer that sowed good seed in a good soil but while men slept, the enemy, the devil entered the field and sowed bad seed. The people slept and an enemy, the Devil came.
What are sleeping Christians? Are we a sleeping Christian?
[1]. Unprepared Christians, not knowing the times they live in. Jesus told another parable about the ten virgins waiting on the bridegroom. While they slept, the Bridegroom came and nine out of the ten were not prepared.
What Jesus is warning about is that when He returns, who will be watching and prepared?
[2]-Luke-warm Christians. [Rev.3:15-16] Jesus warns against luke-warmness. He will spew them out of His mouth. Jesus hates luke-warmness. If you are among the luke-warm Christians, He does not hate you, but He does hate your lack of fervency and zeal for Him.
[3]-Uncommitted Christians. Those that make a half-hearted profession of their faith. Pew fillers, those that will not use their talents and gifts for the work of the Lord’s church.
[4]-Satisfied Christians. Those that are comfortable with their own spirituality. They will never grow beyond their present stage of spiritual development because they will never get out of their comfort zone and step out on faith to do anything else.
[5]-Pastors that will not preach or say anything to wake up these sleeping Christians.
Notice, that while these were sleeping, spiritually, the enemy, the Devil, came in and sowed bad seed.
-The church slept while the Devil brought in abortions. Over 58 million of them since it was legalized in 1975. That is more than 1 million per year.
The church slept through the sexual revolution. 1Cor. 7:2 tells us that to avoid fornication, every man is to have his own wife and every woman to have her own husband. We slept while this was completely turned upside down. Now people are committing fornication to avoid marriage. We have let society and the world view educate our children, girls and boys, about the proper place sex has in marriage. Instead of being the spiritual union between man and wife, it has become a physical exercise for anyone to engage in.
-The church slept while there was a breakdown in the institution of marriage. No-fault divorce prompted divorce on any grounds given. It has resulted in fatherless homes, more poverty stricken homes, more truancy from schools, more delinquency among our youth and failing education and lower graduation rates.
While men slept, while the church slept there has been a change in what society sees as marriage. The bible clearly defines marriage, one man, one woman, man has redefined it. Now we have gay-marriage.
-The church sleeps through the drug culture. Illegal drugs are everywhere. It used to be confined to inner-cities, but now no small town is safe from it. Every day we read in our news papers that there have been more drug arrests. More people are having to be resuscitated from over- doses of heroin and more people dying from it. There are more crimes is being committed by people needing the means to get drugs.
There are many other ways that the church and Christians have slept and let the enemy, the Devil sow his evil seeds. And the sad thing is that this is not a symptom of the worldly only, but has infected the Church also.
Prophetically
Prophetically. We have seen the church and Christians sleep spiritually and now we will see it in a prophetic way.
I have spoken from this pulpit about how everything is ready for the Lord to return. I showed how all the Temple implements were now prepared; All the priests clothing are ready; how they have used the computer to trace the lineage of the priesthood; And that they have the cornerstone for the Temple cut and ready.
This evening I want to show how the world is preparing the way for the Lord’s return.
Joel 3:1-2 For, behold, in those days, and in that time, when I shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, 2 I will also gather all nations, and will bring them down into the valley of Jehoshaphat, and will plead with them there for my people and for my heritage Israel, whom they have scattered among the nations, and parted my land.
More than 70 nations gathered at the U.N. and voted that Israel be sanctioned for building houses on its own land. They demand for a parting of the land to give the Palestinians a portion. Our previous administration was in favor of the resolution and even help write it.
Today the whole land of Israel is surrounded by its enemies that have sworn to destroy it.
The nations of the world is lining up just as prophesied in Eze.38. The United States is provoking Russia by sending forces into Poland which is on the western border of Russia. We have recalled out ambassadors from Russia.
Our new President has shown great mistrust and angst for the United Nations stationed in New York City. Is it out of the realm of possibility that he could expel them from America? If so, where do you think they will relocate? My guess is Rome, identified in the bible as Mystery Babylon. Yes, we are that close.
Zech.12:1-2 “The burden of the word of the Lord for Israel, saith the Lord, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him. 2 Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem. 3 And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.
If we skip down to vs. 9 we read; And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem.
Can anyone seriously say that the great City of Jerusalem is not a stumbling block to the world?
The nations of the world are preparing their world for the return of Christ and they do not even realize it.
3.The awakening of the church.
. Vs.11 “It is high time to awake out of sleep:
Our scripture reading tells us that the night is far spent. This means that we are running out of time. The church has to wake up to this fact. It goes on to say, “ for now is our salvation nearer that when we believed.”
But when and how does the church wake up?
It will wake up when we have churches with men in the pulpit that see the need to awaken their church.
We need more Isaiah’s in our pulpits that will cry aloud, spare not, lift up their voices like a trumpet and show my people their transgressions.
We need more men in the pulpits that are like Elijah that will not be afraid of their faces.
We need more men in the pulpits that are like John the Baptist, that will lay the axe to the root of the tree and let the chips fall where they may.
Men that will thunder from the pulpits across America:
Men that put the integrity of the word of God before their own position in the church:
Men that will care more about souls than they do about their church bank accounts:
Men that care more about filling heaven than the pews:
Men that will preach righteousness rather than the world view of how we should live:
We need more preachers that will expound on the scriptures with clarity and meaning that will reach the hearts of people rather than only their heads.
But it will take more than that.
It will take Christians that will listen with their hearts instead of their ears only. We come and hear a sermon and it doesn’t seem to change our lives in any way; it has no effect on us at all.
It will take Christians that will give their hearts to the Lord.
It will take Christians that will get serious about spending time in prayer for their churches.
It will take Christians that will get serious about the great privilege that we have to come to church.
It will take Christians that decide they are to be more than pew warmers. Remember this, you are never too old to do something for the Lord.
It will take Christians that are just as dedicated on Sunday nights and Wednesday prayer meetings as they are on Sunday mornings.
It will take Christians that will take seriously the call to the men’s prayer time of Saturday morning. It will take more than three or four men.
Our pastor has said many times that we need to get hold of God, and how true that is. But we also need to let God get hold of us.
God got hold of every great man or woman in the bible. Isaiah, Daniel, Ruth, Esther, John the Baptist, Paul and many others. They were determined to obey the Lord, nothing could stop them. They were sold out. They had presented their bodies as a living sacrifice, holy acceptable to the Lord. No giving up, giving out, or giving in.
If we could see this happening across America we would truly see a Church being awakened.
We will see people obeying the instructions of Paul in vv.12b of our text,. “let us therefore cast off the works of darkness, and let us put on the armour of light. 13 Let us walk honestly, as in the day; not in rioting and drunkenness, not in chambering and wantonness, not in strife and envying. 14 But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the flesh to fulfil the lusts thereof.
We will see a church that will cast of the works of darkness, and put on the armor of light. We will be walking honestly as in the day. We will not be walking in rioting, which means reveling or carousing. We will not be a people that engage in drunkenness but will renounce it. We will be people that shun chambering which means co-habitation, adultery and fornication. We will forsake it and be ashamed of that behavior. We will be people that will not take pleasure in wantonness.
We will see churches and be a church that is not engaged in strife and envying.
We will be churches and be a church that has truly put on Christ, not making provision to fulfill the lusts of the flesh.
No, I don’t believe that there are any like that in our church, but we will see people being more involved with the work of the church; soul-winning, serving in the anyway they can. We will see a church awakened.
When I was growing up, my mom or dad would come in and wake me up. Now sometimes Connie will wake me up, or I will wake her up. I want to end this with this question, if you really know the time is short, who can you wake up?