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Adrian Rogers: Second Coming


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Source https://www.oneplace.com/ministries/love-worth-finding/read/articles/can-we-hasten-the-second-coming-of-christ-15204.html

By Adrian Rogers

"Can We Hasten The Second Coming Of Christ?

But the end of all things is at hand; therefore be serious and watchful in your prayers. 1 Peter 4:7 

G. Campbell Morgan, that great expositor of Bible prophecy and the Word of God, wrote, “I never lay my head on the pillow without thinking that perhaps before I awake, the final morning may have dawned. I never begin my work without thinking that He may interrupt it to begin His own. And every night before we go to sleep, we ought to say, ‘He may come tonight.’ Every day when we get out our tools and go to work, ‘This may be the last day’s work I'll do.’” 

The Second Coming of Jesus Christ is imminent—it could occur at any time. Peter would not have told the early Christians (v. 7) to watch, had the coming of Jesus Christ not been something that could occur at any moment.  From the very founding of the Church, Christians have been told to look for and long for the coming our Lord. 

But is there anything we can do to hasten it? Could Jesus’ return happen more quickly because of anything we might do? Listen to Peter again: 

Therefore…what manner of persons ought you to be in holy conduct and godliness, looking for and hastening the coming of the day of God, because of which the heavens will be dissolved, being on fire, and the elements will melt with fervent heat? 2 Peter 3:11-12. 

Is it possible? Can we hasten His return? For the answer to that, I studied what Greek scholar Dr. Marvin R. Vincent and others said about this passage. He and a number of Greek scholars agree that these words of Peter state that by our actions the Church can hasten the Day of the Lord: 

I'm inclined to adopt the transitive meaning [the transitive meaning of this verb] “hastening on,” that is, “causing the day of the Lord to come more quickly by helping to fulfill those conditions without which it cannot come… 

We are causing the day to come more quickly today when we fulfill the conditions without which the day of the Lord will not come. 

Dr. Vincent goes on to explain, 

…that day being no date inexorably fixed, but one the arrival of which it is free to the church to hasten on by faith and prayer. See Matt 24:14: The gospel shall be preached in the whole world, “and then shall the end come.” Compare the words of Peter in Acts 3:19, “Repent and be converted…that so there may come seasons of refreshing.” 

That makes a lot of sense. The Second Coming of Jesus Christ isn’t a time chiseled in stone that can never, ever be changed. Peter says we’re to be looking for—and hastening—the coming of the day of God. Through our

prayers we can cause Jesus Christ to come more quickly than He would have come. 

“Thy Kingdom Come” 

We have been taught that God’s Kingdom is going to come. But how did Jesus teach us to pray in Matthew 6:10? “Thy Kingdom come.”  We’re told to pray for the coming Kingdom. 

 

We know that one day there will be peace in Jerusalem. But there will never be peace in Jerusalem until Jesus, the Prince of Peace, rules upon the throne of David. There won't be peace in the world until there is peace in Jerusalem. When is that going to be? When He comes.  

So what does the Bible tell us to do? Psalm 122:6 says, “Pray for the peace of Jerusalem.” And when you’re praying for the peace of Jerusalem, you’re really praying for the Second Coming of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. And so Peter says, “Watch and pray.” 

"Do you remember what the aged apostle John prayed on the Isle of Patmos? God gave him a revelation of all the glories and wonders that would take place when Jesus Christ comes as King of kings and Lord of lords. Then John closes Revelation with these words, the last prayer in the Bible: “Even so, come Lord Jesus” (Revelation 22:20). 

Are you praying that prayer? You ought to be.

We’re to be learning of His coming; we are to be sober minded.
We are to be looking for His coming; we’re to watch.
We’re to be longing for His coming.
We’re to be praying, “
Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven. And “Let there be peace in Jerusalem, that there might be peace on earth. Even so come Lord Jesus.” 
I long for the Lord Jesus Christ to come. I was talking about the work of the ministry with another pastor, and I said, “Bob, just think about it. Jesus Christ is really coming, and we’re going to see Him.” Then my eyes filled with tears and so did his. 

You see, we got happy thinking about the fact that this is not some fairy tale. Friend, I'm talking to you about reality. As surely as God made little green apples, at any moment, Jesus Christ is going to come. 

If we as the children of God love Him, we long for Him to come. I have Him in my heart—but I long to see Him. To walk with Him and talk with Him, “whom, having not seen, we love” (1 Peter 1:8). Peter continues in that verse to say, “Though now you do not see Him, yet believing, you rejoice with joy inexpressible and full of glory.”

 One day we’re going to see Him—not as He was, but as He is, in all of His majesty, all of His power, all of His glory. 

“Even so, come quickly, Lord Jesus!”"

 

 

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I was encouraged to think about the Day of the Lord. I too look forward to His coming. I think we, as a species, have gotten ourselves and our world in such a mess we cannot extricate ourselves. :(

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1 hour ago, listener24 said:

But is there anything we can do to hasten it? Could Jesus’ return happen more quickly because of anything we might do?

No.

We are told to believe, and to hasten our preparation for the Lord because we do not know when He is coming.

 

The Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins

Then the kingdom of heaven shall be likened to ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom.
Now five of them were wise, and five were foolish.
Those who were foolish took their lamps and took no oil with them,
but the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps.
But while the bridegroom was delayed, they all slumbered and slept.
“And at midnight a cry was heard: ‘Behold, the bridegroom is coming; go out to meet him!’
Then all those virgins arose and trimmed their lamps.
And the foolish said to the wise, ‘Give us some of your oil, for our lamps are going out.’
But the wise answered, saying, ‘No, lest there should not be enough for us and you;
but go rather to those who sell, and buy for yourselves.’
And while they went to buy, the bridegroom came, and those who were ready went in with him to the wedding; and the door was shut.
“Afterward the other virgins came also, saying, ‘Lord, Lord, open to us!’
But he answered and said, ‘Assuredly, I say to you, I do not know you.’
Watch therefore, for you know neither the day nor the hour in which the Son of Man is coming. - Matthew 25:1-13

 

"“But everyone who hears these sayings of Mine, and does not do them, will be like a foolish man who built his house on the sand:
and the rain descended, the floods came, and the winds blew and beat on that house; and it fell. And great was its fall.” - Matthew 7:26-27

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2 hours ago, 4LdKHVCzRDj2 said:

No.

Dear 4LdKHVCzRDj2

If you don't want to join the prayer suggested by Adrian Rogers' interpretation of the Scriptures, I respect that; but at least ask yourself what's the advantage in being so sure that this prayer is useless, and in teaching others not to do that.

If this prayer is not really useful, no one will thank you in Heaven for having tried to stop it, because it does no harm. In the worst case, it just prepares our hearts as you said, because what's a better preparation than asking for that? 

If instead it is useful and you tried to stop it with such conviction, beware, because the worst words that we can hear from Jesus could be:

"You shut the door of the kingdom of heaven in people's faces. You yourselves do not enter, nor will you let those enter who are trying to."

You can also ask yourself: are you trying to stop with such conviction countless of worldly prayers never taught by Jesus? Ask yourself the context in which Luke 18: 1-8 is taught. Are the elects praying for thousands of worldly, invented intentions in that parable, that concludes "when the Son of Man comes"?

This is just a friendly warning.

God bless you.

PS 

4LdKHVCzRDj2: "because we do not know when He is coming."

Don't worry, nobody has never talked -ever-about "knowing" when He comes. This is what the "guessers" do. We are not "guessers", we are "hasteners". If you read the post above from Adrian Rogers, he never mentions it. We don't really need to know "when" it is, to speed it up, nobody said that and it would be an unlogical reasoning: the contrary is true.

 

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2 hours ago, listener24 said:

but at least ask yourself what's the advantage in being so sure that this prayer is useless, and in teaching others not to do that.

There are so many people lost in this world, and if many of them hear the Gospel for the first time, or just have a little more time, they will acknowledge their need to repent and come to the Lord Jesus.

"Therefore be merciful, just as your Father also is merciful." - Luke 6:36

 

We are told to wait for the Lord Jesus, to follow Him, and to preach the Gospel while we wait for His coming.

"And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.
He who believes and is baptized will be saved; but he who does not believe will be condemned." - Mark 16:15-16

 

2 hours ago, listener24 said:

In the worst case, it just prepares our hearts as you said, because what's a better preparation than asking for that?

What prepares our hearts is to have a fellowship with Him daily, by seeking what we need, praying, exhorting, and loving one another.

"But of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only." - Matthew 24:36

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22 minutes ago, 4LdKHVCzRDj2 said:

What prepares our hearts is to have a fellowship with Him daily, by seeking what we need, praying, exhorting, and loving one another.

 

Brother, the things you mentioned don't exclude this prayer :) All of them can be done.

But "praying", as you mentioned, is not enough, because too worldly prayer may actually pull us away from the Lord instead of drawing us to Him, because we risk to "keep on babbling like pagans". But differently from some other worldly prayers, that actually often have the risk to decrease our understanding of the Kingdom (Matthew 6:7, Matthew 6:33 ), this is a prayer very biblical, and that, quoting from another article, many entities(read below) are doing. All of them, except Satan who doesn't want his final demise to come soon.

Read carefully and ask yourself...are you so sure you want to block this intention, maybe in favor of some prayers forbidden by Matthew 6:7, 6:33?

From an article online:

1. - THE HOLY GHOST.

FIRST we learn what is the mind of the Holy Ghost.  “The Spirit and the Bride say, Come” (Rev. 22: 17).  It is (as far as I know) the only recorded prayer of the Holy Ghost: He Who prays “with groanings which cannot be uttered (Rom. 8: 26), when they are uttered, their summary is 

COME.  The significance of this is extraordinary.  The Spirit has a myriad ways of affecting the world for good, yet His prayer is, Come: He knows perfectly all evolution, all progress, all revival, all Gospel advance, yet His prayer is, Come: He knows the inexhaustible resources, the unrevealed powers, the most secret plans of God, yet His prayer is, Come.  The Holy Ghost knows no solution to the problem of the universe except the Second Advent of Christ; and it is His own supreme prayer; thus the fuller we are of the Spirit of God, the surer we are to pray His prayer. 

2. - OUR SAVIOUR.

Next we learn the mind of our Lord.  He says: “When ye pray, say, Thy Kingdom come (Matt. 6: 10).  “This, more than ever in these last days, ought to be the first and last of the Church’s prayers; for all that she desires for herself, for the worldand for her Lord Himself, is comprised in this” (Dr. H. Bonar).  We are apt to see men to the exclusion of mankind; when we pray, for the Kingdom, we plead for thirty generations against one, for God will amputate a single generation - and that, only after countless pleadings in grace and judgment - to save an entire race.  It is the most practical of all possible prayers, for there is no other way whereby the world’s political and social salvation can be wrought, and God’s love for the world at last fulfilled.  “There is no remedy,” as Lord Shaftesbury, who wrought more social amelioration for his generation than any other man, said, “for all this mass of misery, but in the return of our Lord Jesus Christ.  Why do we not plead for it every time we hear the clock strike?”  The Lord Himself,” in the words of Canon Simpson, “would never have bidden us pray, Thy Kingdom come, if those seasons, which no man knows, were so irrevocably fixed that our efforts could not hasten, or our sins retard, the wheels of His chariot.”  If the Jewish disciple, by praying that his flight may not be on the Sabbath or in winter (Matt. 24: 20), can so modify the date of that flight as to change not only the day of the week but even the season of the year, much more is it in the power of the Church to “HASTEN the coming of the day of God” (2 Pet. 3: 12, marg.).

3. - THE APOSTLES.

Next we learn the mind of the Apostles. Jesus says,

 

Yea, I come quickly.”  “Amen,” cries John: I accept the doctrine, I hold fast the promise, I rejoice in the speed: “ComeLord Jesus” (Rev. 22: 20).  It is the last prayer from an apostle’s lips; it is the last and crowning prayer of the Bible; it is the last prayer of the last Apostle of the Lamb: the whole canon of inspiration closes with a direct appeal to Christ to come.  “There may be many years of hard work before the consummation, but the signs are to me so encouraging that I would not be unbelieving if I saw the wing of the apocalyptic angel spread for its last triumphant flight in this day’s sunset.  0 you dead Churches, wake up!  0 Christ, descend!  Scarred temple, take the crown!  Bruised hand, take the sceptre!  Wounded foot, step the throne!  Thine is the Kingdom!” (Dr. Talmage).  It is John’s last prayer, and happy shall we be if, falling asleep, it is the last prayer upon our lips also. 

4. - THE CHURCH.

Next we learn the mind of the Apostolic Church.  “The Spirit and the Bride say, Come (Rev. 22: 17).  In all sections of the Church this prayer has never ceased down all the ages; yet only when John wrote did the Bride, as a whole, thus pray.  “Surely I come quickly,” says Sir Robert Anderson, “are Christ’s last recorded words, but their fulfilment awaits the response of His people, ‘Amen; come, Lord Jesus.’  There is not a Church in Christendom that would corporately pray that prayer to-day.”  Foreseeing this, how impressive it is that the Holy Spirit immediately adds: “And he that heareth - he who has the hearing ear because he has the overcoming life – “let him say, Come.”  IT IS A PRAYER PUT UPON OUR LIPS BY DIVINE COMMAND; that is, when corporate praying fails, infinitely more urgent becomes the individual prayer; and even if the corporate prayer continues, God is not content unless each adds his own ‘Come.’*  Therefore every interpretation of prophecy which excludes this prayer as wrong or inappropriate or inopportune is self-condemned; every argument which silences it blocks the praying of the Holy Ghost through us; and every shrinking from it in our own heart is a work of the flesh. “Hardly had our Lord reached the threshold of the House of the Father than He shouted back, Surely I come quickly; nor does the Church enter into the rapture of her hopes until she brings herself to respond, ‘Amen; even so, come, Lord Jesus’” (Dr. Seiss).

 

[* “This word to the hearer will remain in full force even after the watchful of the Church or the whole Church are borne away.  Jesus’ coming is, to Israel also, the great point of hope.” - Govett.]

 

5. - OURSELVES. 

Next we learn our own need.  All holy and Scriptural desire is legitimate fuel for prayer; and it is our peril so to be concerned with the doctrine of the Advent that we forget the prayer.  In twenty-four volumes of the “Quarterly Journal of Phrophecy” (1894 to 1873) there is not a single article on prayer for the Coming.  Is it nothing to us that our Lord wishes to come back?  Why is He coming quickly if it is not the speed of desire?   “Many Christians do not realise that the Lord is waiting until He is invited by His own to return: we may need to be urged; He does not” (W. Lincoln).  And if our conscience cows us with the danger at the Judgment Seat of a soul only partially ready, let us meet that real difficulty by daily offering a simultaneous prayer - that we may be made so deeply prepared in life and character as to be able to see Him in fulness of joy.  It is a self-purifying prayer.*  Let us learn to say in the golden words of the old Puritan, Baxter: “Hasten, 0 my Saviour, the time of Thy return!  Delay not, lest the living give up their hopes; delay not, lest earth should grow like hell and Thy Church be crumbled to dust.  Oh, hasten that great resurrection day when the graves that received but rottenness, and retain but dust, shall return Thee glorious stars and suns.  Thy desolate Bride saith, Come.  The whole creation saith, Come, even so, Come, Lord Jesus.”

 

[* 1 John 3: 3.  Be it also remembered that the rapture, the first act of God’s response, may precipitate life in the very souls unsaved [and ‘left’ (1 Thess. 4: 17)on whose behalf our anxiety might make us hesitate to pray the prayer.]  

6. - OUR HEARTS. 

Next we learn the language of the fully‑sanctified heart. A whole book of the Bible is reserved as an embodiment of the heart‑cry for each other of the Bride and the Bridegroom.  The waiting Bride suddenly cries: “The voice of my Beloved! behold, He cometh, leaping upon the mountains, like a gazelle, or a young hart” (Song of Songs, 11: 8) - the two loveliest and swiftest creatures of the mountains.  And He replies: “Arise [resurrection], my love, my fair one,* and come away [rapture].  For lo, the winter is past, and the time of the singing of birds is come: 0 my dove [see Is. 60: 8], that art in the clefts of the rock, in the covert of the steep place” - on the precipitous summit of the Parousia.  And then she cries back in words that end the Song: “Make hastemy Beloved, and be Thou like to a gazelle or a young hart” - for swiftness – “upon the mountains of spices.”  In the words of McCheyne: “The day of eternity is breaking in the east.  Oh, brethren, do you know what it is to long for Himself - to cry, Make hastemy Beloved?”  As a friend once wrote me:- “I always feel when one sings Miss Havergal’s beautiful hymn – ‘Thou art coming, 0 my Saviour,’ that I want to prostrate myself on the earth and weep for sheer joy!”

7. - THE CREATION.

Finally, we learn the unconscious mind of the world.  “The whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain,” waiting “for the revealing of the sons of God” (Rom. 8: 19).  Can you say, ‘More than they that wait for the morning, my soul waiteth for Thee?’  “Does your heart leap when you think that the Christ, ever present, is drawing near to us?  All the signs of the times, intellectual and social: the rottenness of much of our life; the abounding luxury, the hideous vice that flaunts unblamed or unabashed before us: all these things cry out to Him, whose ear is not deaf - even if our voice does not join in the cry - and beseech Him to come” (Dr. Alexander Maclaren).  For all the creation needs can be met only by the Advent.  “In this prayer is summed up all that the Christian heart can desire - the destruction of the power of Satan; the deliverance of the creature from the bondage of corruption; the banishment of sin and sorrow from the individual heart and from the world; the restoration of all things; the establishment of the kingdom of righteousness; the beholding by Jesus in fulness of the travail of His soul, the bestowment upon Him in completeness of His promised reward.  Let each member of the Church militant unite with the Apostle in the longing cry – ‘Amen; Come, Lord Jesus.’” (Dr. E. R. Craven). Bishop J. C. Ryle says: “Come, Lord Jesus, should be our daily prayer.”  Shall we not make a compact together that, so long as breath lasts, we will, without a single day’s intermission, pray, “EVEN SO, COME, LORD JESUS”?

 

Source: (http://www.themillennialkingdom.org.uk/PrayingForTheLordsReturn.htm)

 

 

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1 hour ago, listener24 said:

are you so sure you want to block this intention, maybe in favor of some prayers forbidden by Matthew 6:7, 6:33?

Nothing I do will prevent the promise of the Lord to come back and to take the wheat with Him to be fulfilled.

What I am saying is: "If possible, wait a little more, if not then come."

 

I am just thankful for the mercy and grace of the Lord, who patiently waited for me, even when the enemy said:

"Let me kill him, he will not hear you."

But the Lord was merciful and said:

"No, I will still give him one more year."

And exactly in that last year I came to know Him and repent. Glory to God!

 

1 hour ago, listener24 said:

are you so sure you want to block this intention, maybe in favor of some prayers forbidden by Matthew 6:7, 6:33?

Matthew 6:7 is talking about those who believe that only repetitive, long, or memorized and heartless prayers will be heard by Him.

Matthew 6:33 is talking about having a fellowship with the Lord daily, in spirit and in truth. He is your priority #1 in this life.

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We were not anymore prepared for the second advent of Yeshua than for the first.

We watched and waited for the Israelis to get going on building the temple. We studied signs and looked for the beginnings of the seven years. We spent an inordinate amount of time glorifying the AoD and searching for this man of sin.

We did not understand that this type of entity would never enter into a man-made agreement with anybody, least of all Israel. We watched as the world’s political systems diced up Israel via peace accords. We saw Rome gathering its flocks as they headed for the cliffs.

It is only now that I understand Daniel’s words had already mostly been fulfilled. The devil really had us going there; saying Daniel was talking about the anti-christ. Gabriel was referring to The Messiah.
This far reaching anti-Semitic hoax was perpetuated on believers world-wide.

We all wrote books and thesis about Daniel’s book relating Gabriel’s message. We went to seminars and spent so much time looking for something that never happened, nor ever would happen until the very end when Yeshua comes in His Glory. We saw society slowly breaking down as the heavens displayed shooting stars for nights on end. Eventually this shower of small meteorites took out all our satellites.

When communications failed, we were lost. There are just a few of us in this area now as I scratch these words on a rock. I hope someone will read them and learn about deception; and be ready for Yeshua and His Angels.

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2 hours ago, 4LdKHVCzRDj2 said:

Nothing I do will prevent the promise of the Lord to come back and to take the wheat with Him to be fulfilled.

What I am saying is: "If possible, wait a little more, if not then come."

 

I am just thankful for the mercy and grace of the Lord, who patiently waited for me, even when the enemy said:

"Let me kill him, he will not hear you."

But the Lord was merciful and said:

"No, I will still give him one more year."

Brother, I understand your gratitude for finding Christ and your emotions :) I can definitely relate on that.

Reasoning a bit, do you think that year made the difference? Like that if you were died from a disease one year before, you would be doomed forever?

What about all the people born when Christ wasn't coming here? Or lived where the Gospel wasn't spread yet?

Do you think they are all doomed? I don't think that you think that.

Instead I think that if you reason on that for 5 minutes, like Paul, you'll realize that they will be judged according to their heart, and they will meet the Lord in that Day.

You already had the seed of Christ in your heart, from when you was born. You was already, even if maybe unconsciously, searching for Him and for Justice. So if he had come, you'd have been judged according to your heart and you'd have repent in that Day, like the hundreds of millions born when He didn't arrive on this earth yet.

Only those who meet the real Jesus (like if they read the Gospel by themselves, without deceptions or false teachings), and rejects Him, will be condemned, because he who really knows Jesus, without filters, and still rejects Him, would never change, not in a hundred years, nor in a billion years. If you have the impression that you first rejected Him and then accepted, is a false impression, because you were just rejecting a not so clear/uncomplete image of Him. But those who never really met the real Jesus yet, will be judged according to their hearth, just as the hundreds of millions already died where the Gospel wasn't spread. Otherwise, according to your reasoning, it would be better if the Lord never comes.

In my case it was the same too, I wasn't really happy without Jesus, I was still searching in my heart, consciounsly or unconsciously, so even if he had come  years ago when I didn't meet Him, He would have find in my heart the seed of longing for Truth and justice, and He would have shown me His glory anyway, because the power is on Him, not me. The power of salvation is in His hands, not in my earthly body. Who is searching, will find, in a way or another, in this life or in that Day if he dies with an open heart. All those died searching before He arrived, will find Him in that glorious Day. That Day is bad only for those who deliberately refused Jesus after knowing Him very well, but for them there is no hope anyway, otherwise hell wouldn't be eternal but just a vacation!

But for the Spirit, the Church, the Lord, the Bride, our hearts, our soul, that Day is joy: "When these things begin to take place, stand up and lift up your heads, because your redemption is drawing near."

This is so simple and Scriptural, read Paul, find it in the Gospels.

Now while the prayer for hastening is very Scriptural, the prayer for "delaying" the Second Coming doesn't sound so at all!

So maybe, ideas like the one I've just refuted above don't come from God, if the result is hoping that He comes as late as possible.

He knows the right time, but we should ask for hastening, not delaying. We don't want to delay the deliverance from evil of millions of people starving, suffering, being tortured, while we are comfortable on our couches. 

It is true that those who don't hasten, slow it down.

Thank you very much, brother, for expressing your concern, that maybe is the concern of many others who are hoping in their heart that Christ should return late, for this fear, because we can get rid of this fear by simple reasonings like the one above. :) And then, starting praying again, with the Spirit: Maranatha!

Edited by listener24
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1 hour ago, listener24 said:

You was already, even if maybe unconsciously, searching for Him and for Justice. So if he had come, you'd have been judged according to your heart and you'd have repent in that Day

No, I wasn't.

"I tell you, no; but unless you repent you will all likewise perish." - Luke 13:2

 

And if anyone has to repent, it has to be in this life.

"And as it is appointed for men to die once, but after this the judgment" - Hebrews 9:27

 

I was living in the darkness, where sin and death reigns.

"The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness,
and will cast them into the furnace of fire. There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth." - Matthew 13:41-42

 

2 hours ago, listener24 said:

Do you think they are all doomed? I don't think that you think that.

As far as I know they will all be judged according to the light they had received. But in this generation?! People are pretty aware of the light.

"And whoever will not receive you nor hear your words, when you depart from that house or city, shake off the dust from your feet.
Assuredly, I say to you, it will be more tolerable for the land of Sodom and Gomorrah in the day of judgment than for that city!" - Matthew 10:14-15

 

And even when they're aware of the light, and its expectations. They insist in the darkness.

"And this is the condemnation, that the light has come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." - John 3:19

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