Sermon Tone Analysis

Now Is The Time Of Favor

Greetings, church.

It's good to be back with all of you once again at the feet of the Master who said, "This is the one thing needful".

And the one thing needful is to receive his Word and that's what Mary did.

And Martha did not do that.

She was busy serving the Lord, nonetheless, she was serving the Lord, yet she was full of strife, anxiousness, and worries that the Lord had to correct her gently by saying, "Martha, Martha, you are careful and troubled about many things".

Why?

Because she didn't do the one thing.

And Jesus says, "But Mary has chosen the good part, which will not be taken away from her, for one thing is needful".

Now, we think like what the Lord said to Martha, many things are necessary.

Many things in our given day is needful, but yet the Lord says, "Only one thing is necessary.

Only one thing is needful, receiving his Word".

And that's exactly what you are doing every time you tune in on a Sunday to hear the Word of God, or even during the week when you tune in to hear the Word, you are doing that one thing needful that will set you free from the many things of worries and anxieties, amen.

Praise the Lord.

We are living in exciting times, people, and during these times especially, as we see the days ahead.

And I said, I emphasize, we see.

And we are people who are walking by faith and not by sight, and yet by sight, there are a lot of things that can cause fear, panic attacks, and, you know, despondency, as we see the world getting darker and darker, and yet the Bible already says that the world will get darker and darker.

Now, the sense of what the Bible is saying there is, especially in the area of moral darkness, the moral darkness will just increase as people will call things that are right wrong, and things that are wrong right, calling evil good and good evil.

In that sense, that darkness will cover the earth in the last days.

But we also see the signs of the times happening, and it's important that we get Jesus' perspective and what he actually said about the signs of the times because as people right now seeing in the midst of this pandemic and all that, and we have all kinds of varying reports coming from different parts of the world, and we are still in the midst of this pandemic, even as I speak.

And people have different reactions.

And believers especially, they are going online, they're looking at YouTube, and they're hearing a lot of the signs of the times.

And many of it are good, pointing to the return of our Lord Jesus Christ, which is imminent.

But remember this, that the coming of our Lord, the Rapture, can happen any time.

It can happen even in non turbulent times.

It can happen anytime, good times or bad times.

In other words, the imminency of the Lord Jesus's return is always there.

It can happen any time.

It is not dependent upon the signs of the times, whether it's the plagues of, this plague of COVID-19 or all the signs of the earthquakes in various places.

But see what Jesus says in this passage in Matthew where he says, "You will hear of wars and rumors of wars.

See that you are not troubled".

Are you doing that, people?

You know, you see something online and or you hear a message preached on the end times, does it cause fear in your heart?

It should not be.

It should be Jesus centered.

But see what the Lord himself said about the end times.

He says, "When you hear of wars and rumors of wars, see that you are not troubled".

This word "troubled," I shared in a previous message, is the word for like there's a riot, there's a crowd of riot in your mind, all kinds of troublesome thoughts, all kinds of worries, anxieties in your mind.

And as you look at the world, what is happening, see that you are not troubled.

See that you are not worried.

See that it does not affect you in that way.

If it does, then you are not having the perspective that the Lord wants you to have.

Let's go on.

He says, "For all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet".

Hmm, very interesting.

The end is not yet.

Yet we are saying that, I understand the expression, and I myself use it, the sign, signs of the times or the sign of the end, but I try to say sign of the times more than the end because it's not the end.

Jesus himself said, "When you see all these things happening," and he's gonna talk about pestilences as well.

These are signs, but the end is not yet, in fact, it's only the beginning.

Okay, he says, "For nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.

And there will be famines, pestilences".

We are in the midst of one of them now and, of course, pestilences here is in plural.

There'll be other strains of viruses in the end times.

"And earthquakes in various places," earthquakes in all kinds of places, various places.

"All these are the beginning of sorrows".

The beginning, not even in the midst of the end.

Then, you know, Jesus will return, doesn't say that, but I'm talking about Jesus's return after the seven years of tribulation.

I'm talking about the Rapture can happen any time.

It's not contingent upon any fulfillment of Bible prophecy in the last days, all right?

Any time it can happen, whereas the personal return of Jesus, amen, to rescue Israel and to establish his kingdom on this earth will be at the end of seven years of tribulation.

Okay, but the Rapture can happen any time, and we look forward to the rapture.

Praise the Lord.

But nonetheless, as we see the signs of the times happening, it is not sign of the end.

The Bible says that in the last days, God will pull out his Spirit upon all flesh, all flesh includes all the nations of the world, people of varied races and different languages, people of all tribes and nations, amen.

All flesh is all flesh, and the Bible says in the last days, God says, "I'll pour out my Spirit".

I love that word, pour out, amen, abundance upon all flesh.

"And your young men will see visions, and your old men will dream dreams: your handmaidens, your daughters, will prophesy, hallelujah.

The moon will turn to blood, before the great and notable day of the Lord".

That's the end of the seven years of tribulation.

But towards that he says, "I'll pour out my Spirit".

So, we are looking forward for a worldwide revival, hallelujah, amen.

All this moral debasement and all kind of immoralities that we are seeing has all been prophesied.

But in the midst of all this, people become jaded.

They are jaded with all this immorality and the more they indulge in it, they are left with an empty feeling.

They are ready people for the gospel.

They are ready for the good news of Jesus Christ.

Praise the Lord.

May we share the gospel of Jesus Christ to people?

Because right now, there's no better time than to share during this time because people's hearts are "tried that, done that, got the T-shirt," and still come up empty inside because that void, that void is a Jesus void that only he can fill.

When God made man, God, you know, God made man to contain himself.

Man is a vessel to contain the Holy Spirit, amen.

And until then, all our search, our hedonistic pursuits and all our materialistic pursuits will not satisfy that hunger, that void on the inside of us.

Jesus says, "I come that you might have life and have it more abundantly".

So, note this.

As you see all these things happening, remember what our Master said.

See that you don't let yourself be troubled or be worried, amen.

Whatever messages you hear, do not allow that message to bring you to a place of fear and worry about what you see happening.

In fact, in another place, another gospel where he shares about the end times, he says, "Men's hearts will fail them".

That's heart failure.

And don't spiritualize that.

I believe it' also referring to physical heart.

Men's hearts will fail them for fear of seeing those things coming upon the earth.

And yet he's telling us these are not the end of the sorrows.

These are actually the beginning of sorrows.

We're not even in the middle, only the beginning, which means we can pray for revival to happen.

We can pray, amen.

Joel prophesied the revival.

Let's pray for that to happen upon all the nations of the world.

Let's pray for the leadership of China, amen.

Let's pray that God will pour out his Spirit upon all their flesh, bless them, bring them the salvation of the Lord Jesus Christ, bless their health, bless their families, amen, bring them into the full salvation of the Lord Jesus Christ instead of this perspective.