What is the Biblical Day of Christ?

Welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a 30-minute walk through the Scriptures, teaching in-depth Bible truths that change people's lives. Now, here's your host, Les Feldick. Okay, good to see everybody back, and I guess you found the coffee and some of those good cookies. There's a story behind them, of course, some of you know, but whatever, we're glad you came back in, and we'll have another half hour, and for those of you who are here today for the first time, we'll have a break after every half hour program. All right, for those of you joining us on television, if you're ever coming through Tulsa, feel free to call us, and you can be part of our studio audience. Hopefully, before too many more months go by, we're going to be in the new studio. They're out there building on it, and when Channel 47 gets set, we trust we can go back to our tables like we were in the beginning when we'll have more room. So hopefully that won't be too much longer, but until then, we'll just have to put up with the cramp quarters in here. Okay, what's next? Oh, I've got to remind our audience that all the past programs are available on video, audio and the printed page. The Jerry Poole here just has laboriously transcribed all the past programs, and they are now available in a little booklet. They are well received, and we're just amazed how many of those go out every day. Okay, I think that's all the announcements, isn't it, honey? I can't really announce my seminars and so forth on the program here, because we never know when they're going to be played or where. But if you're interested in our travels or anything, you can get our newsletter. Get your name and address to us, and we send out a quarterly newsletter free, and that announces where we're holding seminars and so forth. Okay, now we're ready to hopefully get into the letter of Philippians. Those of you who have been with us all the time know that we came through Romans and Corinthians and Galatians and Ephesians, and now we're ready for the next letter that Paul writes to the Philippian church. And I just put a makeshift map on the board, because I think a lot of people are not always aware of the geography. Antioch up in Syria, of course, directly north of Jerusalem down here, was the church from which Paul and Barnabas first went on their missionary journey, but that was limited only to Asia Minor, which is now Turkey, and they came back to Antioch. Then they made another trip and came up, and they were spending time at Ephesus, and then when they got to Troas, which is probably the old ancient city of Troy as we know it, and they had intended to go back up through Bithynia and hence back to Antioch. But when they were at Troas, they received a call, and I like to have you go back with me if you will, keep your hand in Philippians, and come back to Acts chapter 16. Now this is just more or less introductory to the book of Philippians. Acts 16, verse 6. And so Galatia remember is this area up in central Turkey, and so they have been to Ephesus, and then they went to Troas, and had intended to go on back, but look what happened. And so when they had gone throughout Phrygia and the region of Galatia, and were forbidden of the Holy Spirit to preach the Word in Asia, they were come to Mysia, and they assayed, or they intended to go in Bithynia, but the Spirit permitted them not. And they passing by Mysia, came down to Troas, and a vision appeared to Paul in the night, and there stood a man of Macedonia. Now remember where Macedonia is, Macedonia is northern Greece, it's in the news since it's just south of Yugoslavia, and Achaia was the southern half. But they have this vision of a man in northern Greece, or Macedonia, and he prayed, or begged him saying, come over into Macedonia and help us. Well I had almost the same thing happen in Washington State. I got a letter and a group of people said, please come out and help us. Well we did, and it was worth it. But anyway, Paul got the vision that they were to go across the Aegean Sea, and after he had seen the vision, immediately, no argument, no debate, he knew that the Lord was leading. And so immediately, Luke writes, we endeavored to go into Macedonia, assuredly gathered, that the Lord had called us to preach the Gospel unto them. Now remember the Gospel has never gone onto the European continent before this. Verse 11. Luke 10a Therefore, loosing from Troas, we came with a straight course to Samothrace, and the next day to Neapolis, which was really the coastal city of Philippi. that, and then from there to Philippi, which is the chief city of that part of Macedonia, and a colony, in other words a Roman colony, but a colony meant that they had a certain amount of freedom. We were in that city abiding certain days, and then on the Sabbath, now remember Paul is still fresh out of Judaism, and it would be the Saturday Sabbath, and we went out of the city by a riverside, where prayer was wont to be made, and we sat down and spake unto the women who resorted thither." Now evidently Philippi did not have an official synagogue, there probably were not enough Jews in that part of northern Greece to warrant a synagogue, so evidently these were just a group of Jewish women who were having their devotions and so forth, because there was nothing to indicate that it was a synagogue. But anyway, verse 14, and a certain woman named Lydia, a seller of purple of the city of Thyatira, so I mean she was probably an up and coming business lady, she was highly civilized, don't picture somebody from the boondocks here, this is a highly civilized business woman, and she was a seller of purple, which meant of course that she dealt with the upper echelons, because purple was the most expensive of the clothing, and she was of the city of Thyatira, which of course was back across the Aegean Sea in what is now Turkey, but she worshipped God, and Luke says she heard us. Now here's the part that I'm always referring to, whose heart the Lord opened. Paul didn't, Luke didn't, Silas didn't, but the Lord did, and that Jewish lady who thought she had all she needed, suddenly realized that she was as lost as those pagans around her. And so the Lord opened her heart so that she attended, or listened to the things spoken by Paul. Isn't that something? I told a pastor out in North Carolina, I said I pray every morning for Lydia's, just for this reason, give me people whose heart the Lord opens, and you know it just struck him, he says, I've never thought of it that way, he said I'm usually praying Lord help me sow the seed, but he said I'm going to change my prayer, I'm going to start asking the Lord to give me Lydia's, people who will be the Spirit opens their heart, and otherwise we are just working for nothing unless the Spirit does the groundwork. And so then as you continue on in this chapter, this of course is where Paul and Silas ended up getting beaten because this young magician was being used of the soothsayers, he had cast the demon out and consequently got in trouble with the authorities, and he was beaten, he and Silas were thrown into the dungeon there at Philippi, and then of course we also have the salvation here in this chapter of the Philippian jailer. So what you probably have here between Lydia and the Philippian jailer, and probably another few, the very seed of the Philippian church. And this is the congregation that has now grown over the years, and to which Paul is now addressing this letter to the Philippians. Now then let's come back, and since you realize that Philippi was clear up here in northern Greece, down here is Athens over his corn, but Paul is writing from Rome where he is now in prison. There's a lot of debate of course whether he had one imprisonment or two, and I don't think it makes a lot of difference which way it goes. All we know is that he wrote all these prison epistles while he was in prison in Rome. Now that of course is Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, the Thessalonians, no they were written earlier, the prison letters are repeated again, Ephesians, Philippians, Colossians, 1st and 2nd Timothy, Titus, and Philemon. Those were written while he was in prison over here in Rome, and would soon be beheaded. Now I think also for background, in order for you to just get a little picture of what the man is talking about, the Roman Empire had almost forgotten a lot of the mythological gods, and it had become a worship of the Caesars. In this case it's Nero, and so it was almost a neurology, a making of God out of Nero. And so this is what made it even harder in Paul's prison condition, is that it wasn't so much the pagan gods and goddesses that he was up against, but this whole concept that Rome was the seat of world power, they were the seat of world religion, because the emperor was now God. And of course this is what caused so much persecution amongst the believers, because when they made their allegiance to Christ, then that meant they turned their back on the Roman power, and this of course is what brought in the horrible persecution. So anyway, just for background now, remember that Paul is writing from prison in Rome, and he is right next to the palace of Nero. He's probably associated more closely with the Praetorium Guard, which was right next to the palace. Now as I was thinking on this, I couldn't help but remember when we were in Desert Storm, and we were up against, we thought, the most fearsome troops that Iraq had, and what were they called? The Red Guards. And what were they? They were Sodom Hussein's personal guards. They were supposedly the toughest fighters in the Middle East, fearless. Well they didn't turn out to be quite that good, but whatever. This is what Paul is up against. He is in the very midst of the Praetorium Guards, who were probably hardened, battle-hardened soldiers of the Roman army, and they had come in now as the elite to be the personal guards of the Emperor Nero. And so get that picture in your mind, that these were hardened, battle-hardened soldiers. And remember there was always one chain to the wrist of the Apostle Paul. Early on he even had the freedom, of course, of what we call house arrest. But by the time we get to his writings in the Prisony Thistles, then I think we've got him more confined, and he is now constantly chained to one of these hardened Roman soldiers. Now I'm making that because I want you to see what a tremendous impact that man had, even on those kind of men. We'll see it a little bit, let's move on now. 1. Paul and Timothy, the servants of Jesus Christ, to how many of the saints? All. Not just the church leaders, not just the hierarchy. This letter is written to the lowliest member of the Body of Christ. Do you remember I'm always using the analogy, at least I did back in our previous programs, that Tyndale's prayer was, God let me put the Word in the hands of every plow boy in England. Now how much education did those plow boys have? None. Just enough to read, but yet they were capable of handling the Word of God. This Bible is not just for the highly educated, or the theologians, or the clerical, or anything like that. It's for everybody, regardless of our status. So it's to all the saints in Christ Jesus. Now again, what am I always making reference to? Paul never wrote to the unbeliever. Who did he write to? The believer. See here again, to the saints. Now that doesn't include an unbeliever, the saints were believers. And so everything that Paul writes is to you and I, the believer. Now what does that do? That puts a load of responsibility on us to share these things with the unbeliever. See that's God's way of doing it. The unbeliever can't read this and get anything out of it. It's just Greek to him, and I've had it happen over and over and over. That they just can't get anything out of it. Well, God doesn't expect them to. He's got the saints to do that. All right, and so he writes to the saints who are at Philippi, and with the bishops and deacons. Now again, that word throws a curve. When we think of a bishop, we think of somebody way up in the hierarchy, you know, up there at headquarters. No, the word in the original Greek simply meant an overseer. He just simply is writing to some of the fellows who are more or less holding the group together. Now remember, this isn't a great big congregation. All we think about today of church are the great big plants, swimming pools and tennis courts and basketball courts and all the rest. You know, that's the church today. Listen, that's not the New Testament church. The New Testament church was just a small group of believers, probably meeting in homes, and I think the true church is going to come back to it before too long. But whatever, and he's writing to the elders and the overseers of this little congregation up there in Philippi. And of course, which is in accord not only to the grammatical and the official way of addressing people, but Paul does this through all his letters. Grace be unto you and peace from God our Father and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Verse three, I thank my God upon every remembrance of you. Now you got to remember, what was he thinking of? Well, I'm sure he thought of that very first experience up there in Philippi where the authorities had beaten him and Silas to a pulp, threw him down in the dungeon, and then God miraculously sent an earthquake. Remember all that? Now Paul was just as human as we are, and I suppose every time he heard the word Philippi, that was the first thing he thought of, was that beating, that dungeon, the salvation of the jailer, of Lydia, and then years later he comes through once more, and it appears that he was on his deathbed, deathly sick, and almost no hopes of recovery. But the Philippian church ministered to him, and he survived it, and he makes mention of it then, how close he was to death. So Paul had a lot of reasons for thinking pleasant thoughts of all that had taken place in Philippi. All right, now with the moments we have left, let's go on to verse five, your fellowship in the gospel from the first day when he first stepped foot on Europe, and Philippi, from the first day he could constantly remember the fellowship he had with those Gentile believers. All right, now verse six is a verse that will probably take up the rest of our time, being confident. Now you know when Paul says confident, he means confident. He means no doubts, no eye wonders, this is it. I believe it with all my heart. All right, so he says, I'm confident of this very thing, that he who hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Now here again, you've got to be a Bible student. What is the day of Christ? That's a Pauline term, it's not used anywhere else in the Bible. I haven't got my line up there anymore. The day of Christ is the rapture. Everything beginning from Saul's conversion and the building of the body of Christ, everything is waiting and looking forward to the day when the rapture will take place. And the dead in Christ shall be raised first, he says in 1 Corinthians 15. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. That's the day of Christ. Now let's take it back to Isaiah chapter 2, verse 12. Now this is back in the prophecy end again. If I still had my line up there, I could show you just so beautifully that everything written to Israel was prophecy within time frame. Everything written to the church is in that parenthetical unknown period of time, and it is leading up to the day of Christ, which will end the church age. But here we have the term that's associated with prophecy, Christ's Second Coming. Here it is, Isaiah chapter 2, verse 12. Isaiah 2.12 "...for the day of the LORD of hosts shall be upon every one that is proud and lofty, and every one that is lifted up, and he shall be brought low." Hey that's not grace, that's judgment. And judgment is coming upon the proud, and the high, and the lofty. And you can read on down. Isaiah 2.13 "...upon all the cedars of Lebanon, upon all the high mountains, and the hills, upon every high tower, and upon all the ships of Tarshish, and all pleasant pictures, and the loftiness of men shall be bowed down, and the haughtiness of men shall be made low." See that's not language for believers, that's language for the unbelievers. And it's going to be the day of judgment, the day of the Lord. But the day of Christ is not a day of judgment, it's the day of sudden being out of here. Now let's go back and look at Revelation in light of this day of the Lord, and the day of coming judgment. And Revelation of course is the picture of the whole tribulation seven years, and the accompanying second coming of Christ, which is all part of that day of the Lord, or the day of Jehovah. And it's finally going to culminate then with, oh let's look at chapter 19. Revelation chapter 19. I think there's another one in chapter 5 if I'm not mistaken, but anyway let's look at the one in chapter 19. Verse 11, "...and I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse, and he that sat upon him was called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he doth judge and make war. His eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head many crowns. He had a name written that no man knew, but he himself, clothed with a vesture, dipped in blood, and his name is called the Word of God. Well then you come all the way down through it, and you come to verse 16. And he hath on his vesture and on his thigh a name written, King of Kings and Lord of Lords." And so that is the day of Jehovah, the day of judgment that is coming on the earth. But the church never has that kind of language. The church is never warned to look for the sun being turned into blood, and all these catechismic things. We're not warned that those are things associated with the day of Christ, but it is associated with the day of the Lord. All right now coming back to the term the day of Christ, pick that up a little further, come with me to I Corinthians chapter 1, and I just want to see how often Paul uses this term. And remember that no one else does. The prophets never refer to the day of Christ, the Gospels don't refer to the day of Christ, only Paul. And that again should tell us something. I Corinthians chapter 1, verse 8. Almost a carbon copy of the verse we just read in Philippians, that he was confident that the Lord would keep these Philippians until the day of Christ. Now look what he writes to the Corinthians, and they weren't as noble as the Philippians. The Philippians were a good bunch of people, I mean they were, I think, Paul's pride and joy. The Corinthians, I think they were kind of a disappointment. They were a drag, they were carnal, and they had a lot of divisions and problems. See the Philippians didn't have that, but he still writes the same thing even to the Corinthians. Look what he says, verse 8. Speaking of the Lord Jesus Christ in verse 7, who shall also confirm you, see that language, he shall confirm you unto the end, that you may be blameless. Those Corinthians, yeah, that's what the scripture says. I'm in first Corinthians 1, verse 8, that you may be blameless in the day of our Lord Jesus Christ. Isn't that something? Now remember Paul expected the rapture to take place in his lifetime, but even these carnal Corinthians, he said, if the Lord should come, you're going to meet Him, you better be ready. See another one is in this same book, 1 Corinthians chapter 5, verse 5, and this is even more graphic. Now this isn't license, this isn't telling the believer, go ahead and do whatever you want, and you don't have to worry. No way, because we're still going to all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, and give an account of what we've done in our bodies. But alright, 1 Corinthians 5, verse 5, where Paul is dealing with the immorality in the Corinthian church, and he said, deliver such a one unto Satan, for the destruction of the flesh, that is the body, physical death, not his soul and spirit, for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved, when? In the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. There's the day of Christ, see? So even this immoral Corinthian, had the Lord come, he would have still been saved. Now he would have to deal with that sin at the loss or reward because of it, but his sin of course was totally forgiven and taken care of. Alright, 2 Corinthians is another one, 2 Corinthians, 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, I think it's chapter 1, verse 14. How many 1 Corinthians? 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, verse 14. Yeah, here it is, couldn't find it for a minute. 2 Corinthians, chapter 1, verse 14. Even as you have acknowledged us in part, that we are your rejoicing, even as you also are ours, in the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. And that's something that all Paul was looking for, was the time when this great day of Christ would become a reality. Alright, let's go over to Philippians once again, and there's one more even in this little book. Turn to chapter 2, verse 16. Now isn't it amazing, like I've already said, that only Paul refers to the day of Christ, or the day of the Lord Jesus Christ. Alright, we got to do this quickly, got a matter of seconds. Verse 16, I missed it.