LE RETOUR IMMINENT DU SEIGNEUR JESUS / THE IMMINENT RETURN OF CHRIST

CHRIST THE ROCK CONGREGATION

SUNDAY NOVEMBER 12^TH 2023

SERMON TITTLE:

LE RETOUR IMMINENT DU SEIGNEUR /

THE IMMINENT RETURN OF CHRIST

By Pastor Marc E Simeon

• There is some kind of a fatigue when it comes to preaching about the return of Christ.
• Many churches would go years without preaching about it.
• Many wait for something drastic to happen like: natural disaster, earthquake, hurricane, epidemic, flooding, or man-made disasters like the Corona Virus, to make mention of the return of Christ.
• Every time we are hard hit with calamities, the churches would be filled in the immediate aftermath, but, shortly thereafter the fear would decrease and the drive toward God would reset to its previous state.
• At the turn of the millennium Y2K, for some reasons people paid a lot of attention to the return of Christ.
• In the aftermath of the 2010 earthquake in Haiti, many of the churches were filled in Haiti, and now, things are back to normal.
• The Corona virus gave a great wake-up call at a global scale, and now it feels as if nothing ever happened.

SINCE THE FIRST CENTURY, PEOPLE HAVE BEEN ASPIRING TO WITHNESS THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST IN THEIR LIFETIME

• Let’s face it, every great man or woman of God thinks that the return of Christ will happen in his or her lifetime.
• Some don’t just wish for it, but have wrongly predicted specific days for it.
• It was same for the early Christians just as it is so for us today.
• When people are looking at the rate of the moral decaying of their generations, they cannot imagine that things can get any worse than that. They therefore presume that the end must be near.
• Paul preached the Gospel with the same aspiration of the soon return of Jesus Christ.

Romains 13:11 ¶ Cela importe d’autant plus que vous savez en quel temps nous sommes: c’est l’heure de vous réveiller enfin du sommeil, car maintenant le salut est plus près de nous que lorsque nous avons cru. 12 La nuit est avancée, le jour approche. Dépouillons-nous donc des œuvres des ténèbres, et revêtons les armes de la lumière.

Many have gone as far as predicting a date for the return of Christ, while we are explicitly warned not to do so.

• Many denominations and sects are born out of false prophecies concerning the date of Christ’s return.

THE APOSTLES HAD TO ADDRESS THE FATIGUE OF SOME WHO WERE WAITING FOR VAINLY FOR THE MESSIAH TO RETURN AT THEIR EXPECTED TIME.

• The fatigue of waiting for the return of Christ has begun even before the Cannon was closed.
• That echo of lassitude had reached the first Apostles, which had prompted Peter and Paul to address the issue.

2Pierre 3:1-4 ¶ Voici déjà, bien-aimés, la seconde lettre que je vous écris. Dans l’une et dans l’autre je cherche à éveiller par des avertissements votre saine intelligence,

2 afin que vous vous souveniez des choses annoncées d’avance par les saints prophètes, et du commandement du Seigneur et Sauveur, (3:3) enseigné par vos apôtres,

 3 ¶ sachant avant tout que, dans les derniers jours, il viendra des moqueurs avec leurs railleries, marchant selon leurs propres convoitises,

 4 et disant: Où est la promesse de son avènement? Car, depuis que les pères sont morts, tout demeure comme dès le commencement de la création.

2Pierre 3:8-9 ¶ Mais il est une chose, bien-aimés, que vous ne devez pas ignorer, c’est que, devant le Seigneur, un jour est comme mille ans, et mille ans sont comme un jour.9 ¶ Le Seigneur ne tarde pas dans l’accomplissement de la promesse, comme quelques-uns le croient; mais il use de patience envers vous, ne voulant pas qu’aucun périsse, mais voulant que tous arrivent à la repentance.

PAUL WROTE :

2Th 2:1 ¶ Pour ce qui concerne l’avènement de notre Seigneur Jésus-Christ et notre réunion avec lui, nous vous prions, frères, 2 de ne pas vous laisser facilement ébranler dans votre bon sens, et de ne pas vous laisser troubler, soit par quelque inspiration, soit par quelque parole, ou par quelque lettre qu’on dirait venir de nous, comme si le jour du Seigneur était déjà là.3 ¶ Que personne ne vous séduise d’aucune manière; car il faut que l’apostasie soit arrivée auparavant, et qu’on ait vu paraître l’homme du péché, le fils de la perdition, . . .

THE SECOND COMING OF CHRIST IS NOT NEXT IN GOD’S AGENDA

• To make matters even worse than they are, no one should even focus so much about the second of Christ at this moment.
• The next big thing in God’s calendar is not the second coming of Christ.
• The next big event that will shake the whole world is the RAPTURE of the Church.
• What we now call the Second Coming of Christ was predicted long before His birth.
• The promise of the Messiah of God who would save Israel from its predicaments and return it to glory, was what the Jews were expected of Jesus.
• That’s why John the Baptist sent to Jesus asking, should we wait for another.
• That’s why passages like Isaiah 53 are still so confusing to the Jewish people

THE FIRST COMING OF CHRIST MENTIONNED IN ISAIAH 53 WAS OVERLOOKED BY THE JEWISH PEOPLE IN JESUS’ TIME TILL PRESENT

Esaie 53:1-10 ¶ Qui a cru à ce qui nous était annoncé? Qui a reconnu le bras de l’Éternel?

 2 Il s’est élevé devant lui comme une faible plante, Comme un rejeton qui sort d’une terre desséchée; Il n’avait ni beauté, ni éclat pour attirer nos regards, Et son aspect n’avait rien pour nous plaire.

 3 Méprisé et abandonné des hommes, Homme de douleur et habitué à la souffrance, Semblable à celui dont on détourne le visage, Nous l’avons dédaigné, nous n’avons fait de lui aucun cas.

 4 ¶ Cependant, ce sont nos souffrances qu’il a portées, C’est de nos douleurs qu’il s’est chargé; Et nous l’avons considéré comme puni, Frappé de Dieu, et humilié.

 5 Mais il était blessé pour nos péchés, Brisé pour nos iniquités; Le châtiment qui nous donne la paix est tombé sur lui, Et c’est par ses meurtrissures que nous sommes guéris.

 6 Nous étions tous errants comme des brebis, Chacun suivait sa propre voie; Et l’Éternel a fait retomber sur lui l’iniquité de nous tous.

 7 Il a été maltraité et opprimé, Et il n’a point ouvert la bouche, Semblable à un agneau qu’on mène à la boucherie, A une brebis muette devant ceux qui la tondent; Il n’a point ouvert la bouche.

 8 Il a été enlevé par l’angoisse et le châtiment; Et parmi ceux de sa génération, qui a cru Qu’il était retranché de la terre des vivants Et frappé pour les péchés de mon peuple?

 9 On a mis son sépulcre parmi les méchants, Son tombeau avec le riche, Quoiqu’il n’eût point commis de violence Et qu’il n’y eût point de fraude dans sa bouche.

 10 ¶ Il a plu à l’Éternel de le briser par la souffrance… Après avoir livré sa vie en sacrifice pour le péché, Il verra une postérité et prolongera ses jours; Et l’œuvre de l’Éternel prospérera entre ses mains.

• The Jewish people were so in need of a Messiah, of a deliverer to free them from iron hands of the Roman Empire. 
•  They failed to recognize the day of their visitation from the Lord because of that.

MANY OTHER PROPHECIES NEEDED TO BE FULFILED BEFORE THE AWAITED DAY OF THE LORD.

Ge 3:15 Je mettrai inimitié entre toi et la femme, entre ta postérité et sa postérité: celle-ci t’écrasera la tête, et tu lui blesseras le talon.

• This first prophecy has nothing to do with the Jewish people in particular, but to the entire human race.

Colossiens 1:19-20 Car Dieu a voulu que toute plénitude habitât en lui; 20 il a voulu par lui réconcilier tout avec lui-même, tant ce qui est sur la terre que ce qui est dans les cieux, en faisant la paix par lui, par le sang de sa croix.

• What we’re seeing here, is that the first coming of Christ had many folds.
  • Order was needed to be restored in the creation
  • Things in heaven and things on earth needed to be aligned
  • The SIN problem needed to be dealt with
  • Satan needed to be bordered
  • The generation of Noah needed to be preached to, which Jesus did before his resurrection.
  • The God fearing people of all previous generations before Jesus needed to have their sin paid for to be released from the bosom of Abraham.
  • Many other missions that are not even to the level of human understanding needed to be accomplished in the heavens and on earth, and under the earth, with that one visit of Jesus.
• While the Jewish people were so in need of the promised Messiah, God had to do first things first.
• Other prophecies needed to be fulfilled first before the coming of the Messiah.

THIS GENERATION IS LOOKING FOR A MESSIAH AS WELL REGARDLESS OF WHAT THE BIBLE SAYS

• When we look at the devastating effect of greed in our world today, we too are seeking for a deliverer
• When we look at the injustices that are going on in our world today, we too are seeking for God to send someone to take over.
• The few who are not intoxicated and deceived by the lures of this world can see great dangers ahead.
  • The average person can now create a weapon of mass destruction
• When we see the vast knowledge of mankind and the height of his wickedness, we can only see but chaos ahead.
• We have sicknesses like Ebola, aids, now the super bug , the corona virus, and many others;
  • Terror groups like ISIS, Boca Haran, Hamas and many others.
  • Nuclear weapon in the hands of mad people.
• We all feel the need for a break; yet, that’s not what’s going to happen anytime soon.

WHERE ARE WE IN GOD’S CALENDAR?

In God’s Clock, the human race is very close to what we call the great tribulation

• The great tribulation is the inevitable time in the near future that most of social engineers are trying to avoid.
• A time of total anarchy at a global scale.
• Look at what happened on January 6^th 2022 in the Capital Hill of one of the most civilized nation on earth.
• A time of complete disorder at every level at the same time and in every corner is threatening us the inhabitants of the earth.
• A time of a mixture of natural disaster mixed with man’s wickedness
  • The headlines will read: The never ending snow in the north, the flood in the south, the drought in the west, the epidemic in the east, the invasion of another nation in the border, the global recession in the economy, the mass killing overseas, the famine, the fire over here,  the strikes in every state, the pestilences over there.
• Mankind will have so many problems to solve, that no one nation will be able to carry another nation’s burden.
• Right now as we speak, the temperature is already so high.
• Israel and Ukraine are not as secured to think that they will continue to be favored in their conflicts with their neighbors.
• There is already so much fatigue and disenfranchisement from the so-called allies.
• It will get to the point when God will see fit to remove His church from the fire.
• Since the pressure will be felt globally, there will be no where to migrate for a safe haven.
• The one and only solution for God will be to remove His chosen ones out of the furnace before he cranks up the temperature.
• That’s when the rapture of the church will occur.
• That is the next big event that really concern us today
• The second coming of Christ concerns the nation of Israel and it will happen in its time.
• The Jewish Messiah will make at touchdown on Mount Zion in the most critical moment in Israel’ history
• A day or two later, the Jewish nation would be wiped out of existence.

WHAT IS NEXT FOR NOW?

• Right now we are approaching the end of the dispensation of the church, or you could call it the dispensation of the gentiles, or you could call it the dispensation of grace.
• This dispensation will end with the rapture of the church.
• After the rapture, God will get back to the program he had for Israel.
• All the unfulfilled prophecies about the Christ, the long awaited for Jewish Messiah will come to pass.
• Please don’t fantasize about the world getting better.
• Be sure to know that things are going to get a lot worse than they are right now..
• Don’t believe in any peace deals you hear these days.
• We are already engaged in pre-tribulation, but it’s not so severe yet for God to remove us the church out.
• A few more knocks, and the pressure would be unbearable for the saints.
• Before we reach that melting point, we the Christians will be saying :”bye-bye world”
• The following verses that we find in 1 Thessalonians 4 gives us a snapshot of how it will be played-out.

1Th 4:15-18

15  Voici, en effet, ce que nous vous déclarons d’après la parole du Seigneur: nous les vivants, restés pour l’avènement du Seigneur, nous ne devancerons pas ceux qui sont morts.

 16 Car le Seigneur lui-même, à un signal donné, à la voix d’un archange, et au son de la trompette de Dieu, descendra du ciel, et les morts en Christ ressusciteront premièrement.

 17 Ensuite, nous les vivants, qui serons restés, nous serons tous ensemble enlevés avec eux sur des nuées, à la rencontre du Seigneur dans les airs, et ainsi nous serons toujours avec le Seigneur.

 18 Consolez-vous donc les uns les autres par ces paroles.

• The big question for you and me is: Are you ready?
• Are you sure you are not asleep?
• How much are you focusing on God these days?
• Be sure to know that all the signs have already been accomplished for Christ’s return
• Let us barrow the words of Paul to finish.

Romains 13:11 ¶ Cela importe d’autant plus que vous savez en quel temps nous sommes: c’est l’heure de vous réveiller enfin du sommeil, car maintenant le salut est plus près de nous que lorsque nous avons cru. 12 La nuit est avancée, le jour approche. Dépouillons-nous donc des œuvres des ténèbres, et revêtons les armes de la lumière.

AMEN !