Jeremiah - The World of the End

The World of the End

2022 Dr. David Jeremiah

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To Rob Morgan

My faithful friend

Our world is in bad shape, and sometimes we feel that way too, dont we? In our better moments we know were encompassed by Gods blessing, yet we seem to struggle mightily with anxiety, fear, resentment, and discouragement. The chaos of the world seeps into our hearts. Fear can erode faith if we let it.

Is that true for you? At times, it sure is for me!

From long experience, Ive learned that staying mentally healthy in a crumbling world is our daily assignment, and we cant do it without a buoyant spiritual foundation for our lives. We need God! We need Christ and His teachings. We need the Holy Spirit and His indwelling. And we need the Scripture and its prophecies about the future.

In these pages, I want to show you a special scene in the Bible in which the teachings of Christ, the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and the prophetic words of God come together in a gripping chapter thats too often overlooked.

We call it the Olivet Discourse.

During the final week of His natural life, Jesus sat with four of His disciples on the ridge of the Mount of Olives. There at the crest of Olivet, our Lord rolled out the blueprint of the ages, the master plan for the last days.

Jesus began with a shocking prediction, one that seemed totally implausible in that moment. The massive temple complex, He said, would soon come tumbling downevery single stone! Then Jesus gazed further ahead into the World of the End, and He told us what would happen in the precarious days prior to His return.

In our days!

This is the greatest message on the future ever delivered, and its recorded in Matthew 24 and 25, Mark 13, and Luke 21. (For this book, we will focus primarily on the opening verses of Matthew 24.)

Our Lord knows everything that has ever happened and that will ever happen. He knows it totally, in advance, and in detail; He understands the future into infinity. He already knows everything that will befall you during your lifetime, and He has offered powerful promises in His Word to reassure you of His presence and protection, and of His ordering of your days.

The future of the entire world is in His hands as well. Every sentence in Matthew 24 is addressed to you, if youre a child of God through Jesus Christ. They are for your information, anticipation, and motivation.

When we grasp the Message of Olivet, our plans and priorities will change. Our vision will shift from the immediate to the ultimate. Well see todays headlines in the light of the hallelujahs of His return. Well think better thoughts, feel healthier emotions, respond with better reactions, and do better things.

Christs prophecy, then, must determine our priorities.

Ive spent my adult life studying biblical prophecy, but Ive never studied Matthew 24 more intensely than while preparing this book. To be honest, it seems Ive had more spiritual opposition than usual while writing this book. The devil doesnt want us to know the Olivet Discourse. But Satan is already defeated, and his future condemnation is set.

The One who spoke the words on Olivet rules over the affairs of the nations, and He is relentlessly mobilizing the events of earth toward the imminent rapture of the churchthe final battles of history, the splendor of His return, the unveiling of His kingdom, and the dazzling new heavens, new earth, and new city of Jerusalem.

We dont need to mope about our politics or global problems. We dont even have to settle for coping with the times. We have a hope as sure as the sunshine, as enduring as Scripture, and as glorious as the almighty throne of heaven.

In The World of the End, I want to show you how our priorities and lifestyles must align with these powerful words of Christ, which echo through history from that olive-covered ridge. For that reason, Ive sought to make this book as practical as a toolbox.

In the first chapter Ill describe the dramatic setting and context in which Jesus spoke His prophecy. The following chapters will explain one event after another in our Lords list of the signs of the times: deceivers will arise; wars and rumors of wars will escalate; disasters such as plagues, famines, and earthquakes will bedevil the world; and Gods people will face increasing persecution, betrayal, lawlessness, and lovelessness. In spite of it all, the gospel will spread to the ends of the earth, and Christ will return right on schedule.