When This Prophecy is Fulfilled, Run! Part 2

Announcer (Female): Today on Light on the Hill, we'll hear about a time on earth that is far worse than anything we've ever seen. He's saying it'll be the worst thing that the world has ever seen, nor will it ever see anything worse. That's how we know we're talking about a future time. There's no other way that it could be anything else. It's not figurative, it's not metaphorical. It's going to be unmatched suffering. He says these are going to be the worst days in human history, more catastrophic even than the flood or Sodom's destruction. Think about that for a second. Can it get more catastrophic than a flood that destroys the whole world? Apparently, it can.
Song Singer (Male): I have found the peace only comes from you. I have found the joy only comes from you. Cause all I need is you. All I need is you.
Announcer (Female): We've all had bad days. Maybe it was a flat tire on the side of the freeway, you've been laid off work, or someone you care about passes away. But nothing can compare to what we're about to read in Mark chapter 13. When the Antichrist seeks to kill the Jews, it will be the worst time in human history, and God instructs the Jews of that day to flee to the mountains. Here's Pastor James Kaddis to tell us about it on Light on the Hill.
James Kaddis: So Jesus says, when you see this happen. Let me read this to you. This is heavy. He's telling them in verse 14, "But when you shall see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet, standing where it ought not, let him that readeth understand, and let them that be in Judea flee to the mountains." That makes sense. Why are they going to flee to the mountains? Why is it that they need to run? Why does that need to happen? Well, we read about it. Revelation chapter 12, we get a really good understanding because the Antichrist is going to lose his psycho mind and he is going to seek to kill every Jew that he can. This is speaking to Jews, by the way. It's really interesting. This is why people who believe in the post-tribulational rapture or who are what I would call amillennialists, they have to believe the fact that Jews are not literal Jews, that we are spiritual Jews, because it's the only way they can understand the timeline. But if you take it literally as God intended for us to take it, then you realize we're talking about two distinctly different people. And it's a very important thing to understand. But look at what he's doing here because this is really important. Look, Jesus says it in verse 14. He says, you need to understand. He's making the call for them to understand. He says, "Let him that readeth understand." By the way, that's why I had to go over Daniel with you, because if you don't understand the context by which this is being spoken of, you're not going to understand what Jesus is saying. And Jesus is calling us to understand, and I think it's really, really important. But let's read the next few verses here, verse 15. "And let him that is on the housetop not go down into the house, neither enter therein to take anything out of his house." Can you imagine the picture that that's drawing? In other words, if you're on the housetop of your house, climb down the side and run. The amount of time that it's going to take for you to go back into your house and gather your belongings, you're dead. They're coming after you. That's how hard and fast it's going to be. You hear that happening, literally climb down the side ladder, whatever it is. Climb down. Don't mess around. And it gets way heavier than that. Look at the next verse, verse 16. "And let him that is in the field not turn back again for to take up his garment." In other words, you've taken off your clothes, it's a hot day, meaning you've just got your shorts on. You take your shirt off because you're farming and it's super hot. Don't go back and get your clothes and take off. Don't go back and get your wallet. Don't go back and get your drink. Just run. That's what he's saying. Run. By the way, can I just say for the record, thank God Almighty that none of us will be here during that time? It's not going to be a good time, what Jesus describes here. It's going to be a very ugly time. Look what he says in verse 17, and this is so heavy. He says, "Woe to them that are with child and to them that give suck in those days." That's a heavy statement. I remember like yesterday the very first day we took our two children home. All of our children are adopted. You all know that, it's not a surprise. When we got our first two, amazing little children, I remember that night they come home and we decide we need to go to the grocery store to go get some things that we forgot to get. Kid stuff. You can make a list, but nothing will prepare you for when you just get hit with it all of a sudden. I have a 19-day-old and I have a two-year-old and 10 months. So first starts the task of getting them into the car seat. Well, in order to get them in the car seat, you have to install the car seat. And in my naive thinking, my thought process is super easy, no big deal. After spending an hour and a half trying to install it in my car, we decide to concede and go in Nicole's car because that car was already set up to bring the kids home. But by the time we make that decision, now two diapers have to get changed. So we pull everybody out, even though it took forever to buckle them all in. We change the diapers, then there's a whole new problem that starts. And by the time we leave, it's three and a half hours later. There was a moment, a very quick moment where we were like, how are we going to live? Like, how is it going to happen? I remember those days. I remember when my oldest would struggle to sleep at night and so my wife would take my oldest up to go help her fall asleep and she would be with her while she's falling asleep. And sometimes that would take 20 minutes, sometimes it would take five minutes, sometimes it would take an hour. So the typical scenario would be that my wife would come downstairs, she would hand me my 19-day-old at the time. My little baby, she's just a tiny little thing, so she would just rest on my shoulder. And something about me, it's the padding, I don't know, children fall asleep quickly on me. My children always have. Still to this day, if my son's having a really bad day, he'll fall asleep right in my arms. Which, by the way, I'm mourning the loss of two. He's going into three very soon and I'm mourning that loss. Okay, I just want you to know. So the little one is on my shoulder and I'm thinking, wow, this is probably going to take 20 or 30 minutes. I have four hours of work to do. It's late. Now my wife has been up most of the night because the 19-day-old is crying and doing things babies do, screaming and tired and all that. So my wife is completely sleep-deprived. She never understood what three-hour nights were. She always slept long and she always slept well at night and that was more power to her until she became a mother. Well, those first few months, she would go up to put my oldest to sleep and she would fall asleep with her. And I would be stuck holding my little baby for hours. I can't get up because if I get up, then the baby's going to wake up and start screaming. I'm trying to text my wife, but she's asleep and I'm just... it's rough. And we had some nights where in order to get a little bit of quiet, it would take hours and then a half hour later, it started all over again. And we didn't have time to prepare, we didn't have one to ease into and then we got another. It was just bam, right there. Those first few months, it was wild. Even if we could get in the car fast and move, we would realize we forgot the diaper bag. We forgot one child... no, never got that bad. But it was, I mean, it was crazy. Absolutely crazy. Now it's really hilarious. Now we can get the kids in the cars, it doesn't matter mine or Nicole's. Even if I had to install a car seat, I mean, it would take seconds. But let's have a little fun with Charlie Kirk for just a second. This is a funny story, but the last time Erica was here, and this shows you how good of a father Charlie was, how much he loved his children. Erica is here and this is in July, I think it was. July, she's here and she says, "Hey, James, I'm going to bring the kids over and the kids will get to play with your kids, it'll be a lot of fun." Because they all love each other. And so, oh, that's awesome. Erica, bring the kids, it'll be great. So they make arrangements to bring the kids. And then at the last minute, Charlie recognizes he's got a night off and he tells his wife, he goes, "Baby, I want the kids." Because as a dad, he loved every moment he could have with his children. Talk about a guy who's working 22 hours a day. I mean, just a very, very busy guy. He actually slept a lot more than I did. He was much wiser in that vein. He was very, very good about that kind of thing. And so on that day, he decides, you know what, I'm going to take advantage of this. I'm going to take my babies out on a date. It's going to be so much fun. So we finished with the last bit of recording and Erica's in the back and you can see her in the studio right before we start recording. And she's talking to Charlie and she's being very kind and very patient, and Charlie's getting a little ticked off. You can hear it in his voice. He's getting mad. And I'm like, why is he upset? He doesn't flip out on his wife. He's never yelled at his wife, he's not that type of person. So why is he getting... and he's not yelling at his wife, he's just mad. Like you can tell. And I'm just looking at that like, okay, I gotta figure this out. This is interesting. So I look at Erica and Erica's giggling. She's got a giggling, you know. I'm like, what's going on? And then she kind of signals to me, she says he's having a hard time with the car seat. So they're wrestling with it. He's been wrestling with it. His security guys come in, they're trying to figure out the car seat. They're all fathers, but they don't know how to put in the car seat. And I'm laughing because I'm like, I know exactly what that looks like. Like, it's just kind of one of those funny things. But here's the reason why I think the story is such a beautiful story. It kind of melts my heart every time I think about it. At the end of the whole thing, Erica tells him, "Why don't you just go get the other car? The other car is only a few blocks away. It's over here. Why don't you go have the security, one of the security guys go get the car and you come back?" And Charlie was so mad because he didn't realize that the seats were in the other car because he thought the seats got taken at the last minute to be able to do the thing that we were going to do when she was over here. And the hilarious part about all of that was neither of us were bothered by how upset Charlie was. We were actually happy, but like blessed by how he was. Why? Because Charlie wasn't mad because he was angry or frustrated about the car seat. He was actually mad because at that moment, he felt like he got deprived from an hour and a half with his children taking them to a special day. That's what made him upset. Funny how that works. One of my fond memories. Sorry, kind of triggered a memory. But that was the kind of man he was. He was a father who just loved his babies. He loved his wife, he loved his babies. I'm going to get emotional and stop thinking about it. Anyway, the whole point is, Jesus says, man, woe to them that are with child and to them that give suck in those days. If you're a pregnant woman, that's not a good situation, or if you're somebody that has young children. Why? Because it takes forever if you're pregnant and it takes forever if you're with young babies. There's no such thing as quick and on time. It just doesn't work. And no matter how hard you work to be on time, it's impossible. It just is that difficult because kids are kids and things come up. And Jesus says, if you're with child, it's going to be bad. And then what he says, "Pray that your flight be not in winter." Why? Because the winter slows everything down, doesn't it? Running through snow, all of that. Jesus is saying this. He's saying when the abomination appears, those in Judea must flee immediately. This is the portion of the area that they refer to as the West Bank. You got to leave right away. Go. No time to gather belongings. As I said, Revelation chapter 12 parallels this. God will give Israel, and the Bible says it very clearly, God will give Israel wings of an eagle to flee into the wilderness. You know the reference. By the way, the parallel to that reference is going to be in Isaiah. It's a very, very powerful parallel, by the way. But it's interesting. He preserves and he feeds them for three and a half years. You have to have real Jews in order for that to happen. You have to have a real temple being rebuilt in order for that to happen. Very interesting. The warning here is for times that will be vulnerable. Look, if you're nursing, if you are pregnant, it's going to be a difficult time. Jesus is basically saying it's going to be really, really hard. Look at verse 19 and he says this, "For in those days shall be affliction, such as was not from the beginning of creation which God created unto this time, neither shall be." So many people pigheadedly stick to the idea that what this is talking about is Titus, or this is talking about Antiochus. First of all, there's no way this is talking about Antiochus because Jesus is speaking about this as happening in the future, and Antiochus happened hundreds of years before Jesus is saying this story. So it can't be that. It's impossible. It can't be Titus because it says worse than ever before and will never be worse again. Well, there were many things that were far worse than Titus's destruction in 70 AD, which, by the way, also happened on the 9th of Av, 70 AD. Just go back to the 9th of Av, 586 BC, far worse massacre. One of the worst massacres in Jewish history. Think about that. So if it was 70 AD, it couldn't be that. What Jesus is talking about is he's talking about a moment that hasn't happened yet. He's saying it'll be the worst thing that the world has ever seen, nor will it ever see anything worse. That's how we know we're talking about a future time. There's no other way that it could be anything else. It's not figurative, it's not metaphorical. It's going to be unmatched suffering. These are going to be the worst days in human history, more catastrophic even than the flood or Sodom's destruction. Think about that for a second. Can it get more catastrophic than a flood that destroys the whole world? Apparently, it can. Can it get more catastrophic than fire coming down and destroying every single life that existed in a particular region? Apparently, it can. We know it. We know that that's going to be the case. I think about this, guys, and I think it's so heavy when you read the specifics that relate to this. Okay, let me read verse 20. "And except that the Lord had shortened those days, no flesh could be saved: but for the elect's sake, whom he hath chosen, he hath shortened the days." When he says the elect's sake, you know who he's talking about? He's talking about the Jews. He's talking about the Jews that are living in that time. God is showing divine mercy in all of his judgment. Why? Because he says that he's going to shorten those days. We know what days he's talking about, the three-and-a-half-year period. If it went longer than three and a half years, every single human being on earth would be annihilated. That's the picture that he's drawing here. The fact that it says no flesh should be saved had it not been a result of that, it brings us to a different picture. I hear a lot of people talk about, oh, it's nuclear power, it's nuclear weapons, it's nuclear... you guys understand that you could take every single nuclear weapon we have on the face of the earth and it would not do nearly as much damage as if a massive meteor hit the earth? It'd be far worse than anything nuclear you can imagine. I don't know how people cannot see how through natural intervention something like this can happen. But that's what Jesus is talking about. He's talking about terrible destruction. The chosen people that he's talking about for his elect's sake, he's talking about the Jews here. But let's look at this in verse 21, and we'll read 22 as well. "And then if any man shall say unto you, Lo, here is Christ; or, lo, he is there; believe him not: For false Christs and false prophets shall rise, and shall show signs and wonders, to seduce, if it were possible, even the elect." There are even Jews that will exist during that time that will be deceived by the people who claim to be the true and living God. In that time, we're going to see it. By the way, this speaks to end times. You know, I believe we're in the end times and I think that the level of deception that we see in the world around us is growing and it's growing worse and worse and the blinders are on. People are so deceived nowadays. I mean, just look at the way people are looking at Israel today. Look at how they've just come to accept it because some social media influencer says it. But they don't stipulate to biblical fact. They don't understand or recognize or are incapable of discerning what that's all about. Jesus said it could happen. Deception is going to be a hallmark of the last days and we are filled in a world of deception. Can you imagine opening up a Bible, the Christian Bible, where it says your God is the greatest of all liars? If I could read a passage like that from the Bible, the whole world would celebrate. They would say, oh, it's a con, it's a lie. But yet if I open the Quran and I read these words, "Wa makaru wa makara Allah wa Allahu khayru al-makireen," which says Allah is the chief of deceivers, they call me an Islamophobe and every kind of curse word you can think of. We just elected one Zahra Martandami to become the mayor of New York City, a full-blown open Islamic fundamentalist who does not even agree with the idea that Jews should be open to self-determination, that they should have their own state. Think about that. Deception is growing. In the last days, we're going to see that again and again and again and again. But look at how Jesus prepares everybody. Watch this, and this is, we'll close on this verse. "But take ye heed." That's what he says, verse 23. "Take you heed: behold, I have foretold you all things." Wow. He doesn't give us this information to frighten us. He gives us this information to prepare us. What do we learn? Forewarned is forearmed every single time, isn't it? If God told us what would be coming, then we can remain steadfast because we know exactly what to expect. The Bible makes it very, very clear. We as his people must not be deceived by signs, which is why we don't look for signs. You know what I mean when I say that? Meaning we're not looking to make this a sensationalistic moment. God has given us the indicators that we need. As believers, we're not supposed to be discouraged by affliction because God told us that it would happen. We're not supposed to be distracted by false hopes. Oh, the rapture's going to happen tomorrow. Don't be distracted by those lies. Those are false teachers, don't listen to them. We've even heard Calvary Chapel guys make predictions like that. It's just crazy. Absolutely nuts. We don't believe that stuff. What does he want us to do? He wants us to stay watchful, to be grounded in his word, to be ready for the Lord's return. Be aware, understand what God's word says.
Announcer (Female): Thank you for joining us today for Light on the Hill. What you just heard is one part of a series called the Olivet Discourse. If you'd like to hear more, or download any of our past episodes, please visit lightonthehill.com. That's lightonthehill.com. Thank you for listening. Tune in next time for more from Pastor James Kaddis right here on Light on the Hill.