Matthew 24:36-51
New International Version 1984 (NIV1984)
36 “No one knows about that
day or hour, not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. 37 As it was in the days
of Noah, so it will be at the coming of the Son of Man. 38 For in the days before
the flood, people were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, up
to the day Noah entered the ark; 39 and they knew nothing about what would happen until
the flood came and took them all away. That is how it will be at the coming of
the Son of Man. 40 Two
men will be in the field; one will be taken and the other left. 41 Two women will be
grinding with a hand mill; one will be taken and the other left.
42 “Therefore keep watch,
because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. 43 But understand this: If
the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he
would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. 44 So you also must be
ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect
him.
45 “Who then is the faithful
and wise servant, whom the master has put in charge of the servants in his
household to give them their food at the proper time? 46 It will be good for that
servant whose master finds him doing so when he returns. 47 I tell you the truth, he
will put him in charge of all his possessions. 48 But suppose that servant
is wicked and says to himself, ‘My master is staying away a long time,’ 49 and he then begins to
beat his fellow servants and to eat and drink with drunkards. 50 The master of that
servant will come on a day when he does not expect him and at an hour he is not
aware of. 51 He
will cut him to pieces and assign him a place with the hypocrites, where there
will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.
One
thing that is very important to remember, these times will be like the day of
Noah, no one will expect anything to happen and then it will. This is what has made me think that there
might not be a lot of Christians left on this earth because in the days of Noah
there was one faithful man and his family.
Yet God may not let it go on as long as He did in the days of Noah. Only
God knows the hour of His return.
One
thing is for sure, Christians will be working right alongside non-Christians as
we see in our text. One of those, the Christian,
will be taken while the other one left.
Are you working next to someone who is not a Christian? If so, are you speaking to them about God or
is that a subject you are not going to approach someone with because you don’t
want to offend them?
Keep
watch, we should always be anticipating His return. There have been many people who have gone to
be with the Lord that had expected Christ to come during their lifetime. There are many people today who believe the
same thing. That is what I would call “keeping
watch”. We should always be expecting
Him because that keeps us thinking about how we want Him to see us when He does
return. It keeps us serving Him and it
gives us hope.
Look now
at the last part of this scripture. It
is written for those who claim to be servants of God. When we claim to be His servants we better be
just that. There are people in this world
who claim to be servants yet they do not act that way. They think that the Master is gone and has
put them in charge. They tend to do
things and make decisions on what is best for them. They tend to believe that they need to take
action because God isn’t here to do so. This
is just like the servant in the passage.
He beat other servants up because he thought the master was gone. He elevated himself above the other servants,
thinking he was better than them. God
will not put up with this, He will reveal the truth. It says that these people will be cut in pieces
and assigned to a place where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. It will not be a place anyone would want to
spend eternity.
A question we as Christians need to have in
our minds, “Is this how I would want Jesus to see me if He returned to earth
right now?” If your answer is “yes” then
it is a good thing. You must be serving
the Lord with gladness and depending upon Him for everything.
For
those who think they are a child of God and can now do whatever they please,
you are wrong. Yes, we are saved by
grace, yes it is like we had never sinned, yes, God does forgive us but we must
have a change in our thought process and our actions in order to fully
demonstrate the power of our risen Savior.
We were once dead in sin but now alive with Him. If this doesn’t change the way you think and
act, you probably are still holding on to self rather than clinging to God as
you everything. We must not do things
for ourselves but for the Lord. We don’t
want to be like Adam and Eve who tried to hide from God, it didn’t work for
them and it won’t work for us!
There
are wicked servants out there that claim to be servants of the Lord. They begin to think that they are better than
anyone else. They condemn others in such
a way that it is like a beating. They
expect others to follow them rather than to follow the Lord. And, they drink right alongside the
drunkards. They may say that they do
this because Jesus act with the tax collectors and the sinners. Yes, He did, yet Jesus’ intentions and their
intentions are quite the opposite. As I
read this scripture I see these people who are participating in the
drinking. They are most likely drunkards
themselves. They may say they are just
wanting to get the people comfortable around them and then they will win them
over to the Lord. Yet, what the people are
seeing is them as hypocrites. Just like
the hypocrites that have kept them away from the church. Jesus knows our hearts. He knows our motives and He sees
everything. Every day we should be
asking ourselves, “What would Jesus want me to be doing?” Every hour we need to make sure we are not
walking the path to destruction but that we are walking the path to Him.
Seek
Him, know Him, because it is Him whom we will have to give an accounting of our
actions. How will Jesus find you?
Seeking
Him with all my heart,
Sheila
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