A Time to Rest

Welcome everybody, and it's good to see everyone. Nice to have some more chairs filled. I want to begin by bringing some of you who are new up to speed a little bit, because here we look at the Bible in connection with God's first book.

You know what God's first book is? Creation, especially in the heavens, the stars. If we look at Genesis, this is Revelation, but if we go to Genesis 1, and verse 14. Here we have the Spanish, and German, and I have to use the English. In verse 14, it says, and God said, let there be lights in the firmament of the heaven, to divide the day from the night, and let them be for signs, and for seasons, and for days and years.

So, God created the lights in the heavens, the sun, the moon, and the stars, for signs, as well as for time, to understand the time. And, when Jesus' disciples asked him about the time, especially the time of his return, he answered many things. He said, when you see these things begin to happen, this is Luke chapter 21, and verse 28. And he said, when these things begin to come to pass, then look up. What do you see when you look up? You see the heavens, you see the stars. Look up, lift up your heads, for your redemption draweth nigh.

Now the things that he was talking about in that chapter are many events, things that happen in the world. We see those things happening, we've seen that for years, in these last times. So, this applies to us, because we're starting to see those things begin to happen. So it's our job now to look up. He said, look up when you see those things. Then, what happens if we look up? In Matthew chapter 24, this is Matthew's description of the same answer that Jesus was giving to them. Then Jesus says something very interesting.

When you look up, he talks about some signs in heaven. Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man. So first, when we see things happening in the world, like he was describing before. I'm not going to talk about those, but we understand in general that we're in those last days. So we look up, and what do we see when we look up? We see the sign of the Son of Man.

And then he goes on and describes some other things that will happen. Then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn. And they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds, in the clouds of heaven, with power and great glory. So just before the second coming of Jesus appears the sign of the Son of Man, and that sign we see in the heavens, in the stars. Today we have special technology, and we can actually see the stars even on a rainy day.

So here is a program that shows us the whole sky. There's the whole night sky from one end to the other. If I zoom in a little bit, you can see there's the Milky Way.

So where do we see the sign? Where do we see God's signs in the heavens? They're in the stars, but there must be some meaning, something that gives meaning to them. There are symbols. We've been talking about those symbols for several weeks, so we're going to look at some of that.

But it comes from understanding that in the stars there are, first of all, constellations. You have groups of stars, and they are in different shapes. And we're moderately familiar, maybe, with some of those.

You've heard of the zodiac and the twelve signs of the zodiac that follow the path of the sun. But there are many, many constellations all through the sky, and they never move. So how does God point to a specific place in the heavens? You have to have something that points, you have to have a pointer.

And those pointers, the pointers that God uses are the lights. The greater light, the sun and the moon, and the planets also, they move, and they're moving stars. Now, this is God's creation, and Satan has a counterfeit for that, and that's where astrology comes in. What we're looking at is different than astrology. This is because we take the signs of heaven, and we always compare it with the Bible.

That's the important thing, to compare God's two books, the written word with the created word. So in that way, we follow the prophecies in the Bible, and what we've learned from the heavens is about the time. Remember, in Genesis, it said, the signs, in Genesis 1, verse 14, the lights in the firmament of heaven, the sun, the moon, and the planets that move, they are for the signs, and for seasons, days, and years. In other words, for the time.

So we learn about the time through the signs, and by comparing that with God's written word. Okay, and then Jesus said, when we do that, and the time comes, we will see the sign of the Son of Man. Just before his actual return. We believe that we can see that sign now. Where is it? I wish I could take the time to explain how we came to understand the sign.

We have talked about that in prior weeks, but let me show you, first of all, where it is, and how one aspect of how we found it. There are also, besides the sun, the moon, and the planets, there are also other lights in the heavens. Those lights come every once in a while, and they're called comets. That's what we have been studying. There are certain things about the comets, when we compare that with the Bible, and the symbolism that the Bible uses. Then we learn that they fit with a particular passage in the Scriptures.

So let's look a little bit. Here are where the planets go. They follow a course along the ecliptic.

Excuse me. I'm just advancing the time a little bit, and you can see, there we go. You can see they move along one line, all the planets, going very fast. Here, you see the sun going by year after year, and this is how God points to different places.

And then, but the comets, they don't necessarily follow that one line. So the comets are God's way of pointing to other places in the heavens, besides just the path where the sun and the planets follow. And in doing so, we learn more about the symbols. So those symbols come from the constellations.

Many of them are ancient, some of them are more modern. If we show the artwork, I've colored some of these, because we use them more. In this area, if I can get through here, here we see Orion.

We spent more than a decade, or about a decade, studying Orion, just Orion. Another name for Orion is the hourglass, because it has that hourglass shape. Now what is an hourglass used for? It's used to measure the time.

There's, in all of the heavens, there's a lot of animals, there's some people, dragons, there's a woman, mostly animals. But there are some tools, and there are only two time-telling devices. The hourglass in Orion, and the pendulum clock.

And there's a lot of significance in that, that I can't cover today. But there are two comets that travel through this area, through a particular time. Okay.

So, these two lines are the path of two comets in the sky. And they're making this path right now as we speak. In March, is when it came from the clock.

And it's up here in this area right now. On the other side, here was from March, and right now we're up in this area. So this spans a little over a year.

And we first discovered this sign actually from another comet that passed through the clock. It was discovered as the biggest comet ever discovered. And the date that it was discovered was Jesus' birthday.

According to the Hebrew calendar. So already, just from that, we said, hey, this is connected to Jesus. But more than that, it comes the closest to Earth in 2031.

And that's exactly 2,000 years after Jesus' crucifixion. So we see two points in that one comet when it was discovered on Jesus' birthday, according to the Hebrew calendar. And it comes closest to Earth 2,000 years after Jesus' crucifixion.

So we said, hey, that's significant. That means something. So we studied that more, and it led us ultimately to recognize how this clock works.

And when it strikes midnight. Midnight is an important hour in the Bible. You remember the story that Jesus told of the ten virgins? It says, then let's look at that.

Because it's always good to actually see. It's in Matthew chapter 25. It's always good to read from the Bible, to see it with our own eyes.

And Jesus says, then shall the kingdom of heaven be likened unto ten virgins, which took their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom. Five of them were wise. Five were foolish.

If you were here last week, we talked about those five wise and five foolish. And how we see them represented in the symbols of heaven. They that were foolish took their lamps, took no oil with them.

But the wise took oil in their vessels with their lamps. And while the bridegroom tarried, they all slumbered and slept. And then, at midnight, there was a cry made.

Behold, the bridegroom cometh. Go ye out to meet him. So, this happens at midnight.

And in the story, who is represented by the bridegroom? This is a story that describes Jesus' coming. Jesus is telling this story, and he's saying, this is how I'm going to return. It's going to be like this.

We have five wise virgins, five foolish virgins. And at midnight, a cry will be made that the bridegroom is coming. And that cry is what we see here.

When the clock strikes midnight, which was in March, then the cry began to go out as the comets form the sign. This is the sign of the Son of Man. It tells us that the Son of Man is coming.

It's the cry that goes out at midnight from the clock. What does it look like? A fish, exactly. And what did Jesus say? He said there would be no sign given except what? Except the sign of Jonah.

And Jonah, the story, talks about how Jonah was the prophet that got swallowed by a great fish. God uses imagery. He always told stories so that people would imagine how those things take place.

And he does the same thing in the heavens. He tells the story of the Scripture, and particularly the story of time, with the pictures in the heavens. Another thing that Jesus said was that in the end of time, in the coming of Jesus, it would be like it was in the days of Noah.

And then he says, let me just read that. Matthew 24, verse 37. But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of Man be.

So that means that we can look at the story of Noah and apply that in our time, because now we're seeing even the sign of the Son of Man when he will come. So let's look at the story of Noah briefly. This comes from Genesis.

And so you know that this Noah was the one in the antediluvian times when God destroyed the world by fire, by water. And God told Noah to build an ark. And he gave him many instructions.

And then he told him to get in the ark and that a flood would come. And the ark was his way of protection. That was how he would protect Noah in the ark.

Okay, here it is. Chapter 7. Chapter 7 and verse 11. In the 600th year of Noah's life, in the second month, in the 17th day of the month, the same day were all the fountains of the great deep broken up and the windows of heaven were opened.

Now I want you to notice in the 600th year, Noah, they lived a lot longer than we do in those days. He was 600 years old when the flood came. And this is when he got into the ark.

In our time, it's not 600 years. But from creation, it's more or less 6,000 years. So we see a similarity.

And furthermore, Noah, in Hebrew, is a word. Just like sometimes we name our children. Like in English, you might name a daughter Grace.

It's a word that has meaning on its own. It's the same with Noah. Noah is a Hebrew word.

That word means rest. So what this is saying is in the 600th year, Noah, or rest, he entered the ark. So after 600 years, he had rest.

When they named Noah, they said, this one shall give us rest. Therefore, they named him Noah, rest. So Noah serves as an illustration or a type for Jesus.

Because Jesus is the one who gives us rest. And he gives us that rest, not after 600 years, but after 6,000 years. There's more we can say about that in a little bit.

But let's look at that in the context of the sign of the Son of Man. I've turned on the boundaries so we can see where. And these are just lines that astronomers have used to divide the constellations.

And so it makes it easier to see which ones are where. So Noah entered the ark. And you see that this is the sign of Jonah.

Now what happened with Jonah? He was swallowed by the fish, right? So he got swallowed. He was inside, okay? Now this is the sign of the Son of Man. So we want to be in Christ, right? Just like Jonah was in Christ or in the whale.

He was therefore protected. The whale protected Jonah, otherwise he would have drowned in the sea. That was his intent, but God had other plans for him.

So if we look at what is inside, we see some interesting things. We have been talking in the last weeks, for those of you who have been here, about the seven churches that are described in the book of Revelation. In Revelation 2 and 3, there are letters that Jesus dictated for seven different churches.

There was a church of Ephesus. There was a church of Smyrna. Church of Pergamos.

Thyatira. Seven different churches. We've been talking about those for a while, and let me just show you what we have found.

If we look at those seven churches, there are things that correspond to the symbolism that we see in the heavens. One thing, for example, is the church of Laodicea. Laodicea is the seventh church.

If you look in Revelation 3, Jesus' letter to the church of the Laodiceans, he says in verse 15, I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot. He's talking about water. There was a river that flowed through Laodicea, and it was neither hot water.

It came from hot springs, but it was too far away. By the time it came to the city, it wasn't cold, but it wasn't hot. In verse 16, it says, So then, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth.

When we look in the heavens, we see water. Here's the mouth of the fish, the sign of the Son of Man. This water is out.

It's being spit out. It's symbolism. I wanted to mention this about the churches, because there are seven churches.

To each church, Jesus says that he knows their works. All seven churches, Jesus says, I know your works. I know your works.

I know your works. And then for most of the churches, he says, or actually for all of the churches, he says to him that overcometh. And then he gives a promise, different promise for every church.

So those who overcome are those who are inside, inside Christ, inside the sign of the Son of Man. Those who don't overcome, Jesus gives warnings to all of the churches, most of the churches. And those would be represented on the outside.

And there are seven churches. Now, Laodicea is only shown on the outside. But for those who repent from Laodicea, there is a place inside for them as well.

And that is over here. The symbol of a dog comes from Revelation 22. In verse 15, it says that the dogs are outside the city.

It says, For without, it's talking about the city here. For without, outside the city, are dogs and sorcerers and whoremongers and murderers and idolaters, whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. In Laodicea, they were lying to themselves.

Because Jesus had some hard words to speak to them. Jesus said, I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I would that you were cold or hot.

So then because you are lukewarm and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth. And then this is their lie that they believed. Thou sayest, I am rich and increased with goods, have need of nothing.

And you know not that thou art wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked. So the Laodiceans, they had those lies. They believed lies about themselves.

And Jesus told them, it's not so. You're really wretched, miserable, poor, blind and naked. Those are hard words.

It's not something that most people would like to hear. Doesn't make us feel very good about ourselves. But that is what Jesus said.

And they would be outside the city. Those who partake of those lies are among the dogs. They're in that list that's headed by the dog.

But there is a part that repents. They're inside. There are a few.

Jesus said, if any man hear my voice, then I will come into him. Talking to individual people. So the seven churches are illustrated here.

But in the context of Noah, we see something similar. How many people went into the ark with Noah? There was Noah. Eight in total.

There was Noah and his wife. He had three sons. And each of them had three wives.

So there was Noah and seven others. So let's just count a little bit. Now Noah is a symbol for Jesus.

Okay. How did Noah and his family come into the ark? Did they jump in? They came in through a door, right? He made a door. The angel opened the door.

And he entered, right? So coming in through the door. Now who? What does the door represent? Jesus said something about a door. He connected the door with who? He connected it with himself.

He said, I am the door. And here we see the door, if you will. If we imagine this not as a fish now, but as an ark of protection.

This would be, this is the only opening. That's the door. And coming in the door, Jesus said, I am the door.

And we see here a clock. And this clock, for reasons that we've been talking about, represents, in prior weeks we've been talking about it, it represents Jesus. Jesus is also represented in Orion.

And he's also represented here, in the river. You remember a story in the Bible where Jesus was baptized? What happened at Jesus' baptism? There was the dove rested on his head. And here we see the very same imagery.

The dove coming down, and that was John the Baptist's sign. He said, that's the sign that this is the Christ. When the one whom the dove comes upon, that is Jesus.

And we see that also pictured here in the center of the sign. Jesus buried in the water of the river, being baptized with the dove coming down. So we have different symbols for Jesus in this sign.

But going back to Noah, Noah is the one who represents Jesus. So he would be represented by the clock coming into the ark, the ark of protection. And then if we compare this with the churches, we have how many others joining him? First of all, we have one here, and we can include the dove with this one.

So that's one, two, three, four, five, six, seven. Seven people, seven things inside that represents Noah and his family. Now that's just a nice little thing, I think, but it's not the main point.

Jesus told us that it would be like in the time of Noah. And Noah and his family entered the ark. And we see, in a sense, Noah and his family entering the ark there.

But there's much that we can learn from this. And I want to look especially at the clock, because that's one of the symbols for Christ. We have three symbols for Christ in this sign.

In Orion, as the ministering priest, we have Jesus being baptized when he was here on earth. And we have Jesus represented as the time. And that's especially important in reference to the churches.

I want to show you why. I mentioned that in every one of the churches, in his letters to the churches, he says, for example, to the Laodiceans, verse 15, chapter 3. I know thy works. Every one of the churches, he said, I know thy works.

Now this is a difficult theme for many people, because nobody really wants to talk about works. As soon as you talk about works, then, well, we say, oh, don't judge, right? And that's right, because we're not the judges. But Jesus is.

And he says, I know your works. And he proceeds to tell them some good things as well as some bad things for those churches. And we can take that to heart.

There are things that Jesus tells us, some good things and some things that need to be changed. Now, what is time for? What is time for? To measure, okay. And for measuring what? You measure time, yeah.

But why do you measure time? Okay. Okay. So, for example, if you want to meet someone, you need to have a time where to meet them, right? How many of you looked at the time this morning? I think we all did, right? We all look at the time.

Why did you look at the time? Because you want to come at our meeting place at the right time, right? Okay. We have time so that we can do something, right? We want to go somewhere or we want to do something. We have to have time.

So, whatever works that we do, they're done in time. That's what time is for. God gives us time to do, to do our works.

So, when he says, I know thy works, he's coming from the perspective of the time. He is the clock, and he gives us that time. You know, the Bible says, in him we live and move and have our being.

In him, in Christ, he is the time. And he knows our works because he gives us that time to do those works. But he stands at the door, and he says, what are your works like? Do you have good works or bad works? Now, in the letters to the churches, he tells them things that are not good about their works.

And he wants them to change those works. And that's where many people stumble because it makes us feel not good, right? We want to feel good about ourselves. And when Jesus tells us there's something wrong, well, then we feel bad, right? So, what's the answer? Jesus gives counsel, and in the end, he says in verse 19, for example, this is similar for other churches.

He says, as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. So, is it a bad thing then when God tells us there are problems in our life? No, we can be assured that he loves us because he tells us those things. Imagine an artist is painting a picture.

And he looks at the picture, and he says, there's something wrong. The artist wants to correct that. Why? Because he wants to paint a beautiful picture.

He wants all the imperfections to be out of it. And that's how Christ is with us. We are the painting.

And he says, there's something here that's not quite the way I want it. It's not as good as it could be. And so, he points those things out because he wants a beautiful picture in the end.

And then he says, as many as I love, I rebuke and chasten. Be zealous, therefore, and repent. And that repentance is a choice.

It's simply a choice. We choose either Christ's way or man's way. Now, it's interesting to look at the symbolism in the sign.

I don't know if you can see it, but on the clock, there are two numbers that are marked by the comets. Straight down from the clock is what hour? At the very bottom, 6 o'clock. So, we have the number 6 highlighted by that comet.

And then, one hour later, the other comet marks the number 7. Now, 6, like we saw in the case of Noah, 600 years, that represents man. Six is the number of man in the creation. That's where it comes from.

On the sixth day, God created man and gave him dominion over everything he had created until that time. And what happened on the seventh day? Then God rested from his works. So, we have 6 and 7. We have man's works and Christ's works.

We have this contrast. Now, I want to show you in the Ten Commandments, in Exodus chapter 20 and verse 8. It says, remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy. Six days you shall labor, shall work.

Six days you shall work and do all thy work. But the seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. So, we have this contrast in the Sabbath commandment.

There's a strong contrast between man's work and God's work. Six days you shall labor, do all your work. But the seventh day is for the Lord.

The seventh day is the Sabbath of the Lord thy God. In it, you shall not do any work. So, he makes a clear separation.

Six days are for man. The seventh day is for God. Now, I want to mention that Paul says of the law that the purpose of the law is to bring us to Christ.

And I'm trying to find that verse. Do you know where it is? Yes, in Galatians chapter 3. Galatians chapter 3 and verse 24. Wherefore, the law was our schoolmaster to bring us to Christ.

Anybody in school? Some of you younger people. We're all in the school of life, right? And the law is the schoolmaster. The teacher who brings us to Christ.

That we might be justified by faith. So, this issue of works, it's embodied in the Sabbath commandment. And that is reflected in the clock.

Six days for man. But the seventh day, those are the two numbers highlighted in the clock. Six for your work.

And the seventh for God's work. And so, in the clock, we see that choice. Our work or Christ's work.

The purpose of the Sabbath is so that we make that distinction between our work and Christ's work. And Jesus said in Matthew chapter 11 and verse 28. He was talking to those who labor.

And he said, come to me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden. You're doing works. And I will give you rest.

So, Jesus is telling us, come from your works on the sixth days. Come into my rest on the seventh day. So, the Sabbath, it's a symbol in itself.

It's saying, come into my rest. Away from your works, into my rest. That's the decision that we see for entering the sign.

We enter into his rest through the symbol of the Sabbath. But there's more to the Sabbath than just the day of the week. Because the Sabbath is about that choice of my works.

Or, like we read a minute ago, being brought to Christ that we might be justified by faith. When we come to Christ by faith, we come into his rest. And then he does the works.

When Jesus makes that separation between the works, he said the Sabbath, it's less about the day. And it's more about the symbolism, what we do in that time. The sixth days are for man's works.

The seventh day is for Christ's works. Now, let me ask you a question. What happens if Christ is ruling in our hearts? And we have followed the law as the schoolmaster.

We've come to Christ. We have faith in Christ. Who then is doing those works? Jesus.

Jesus does the works through us. So Jesus does his works on the Sabbath. And Jesus does our works on the sixth days.

It's all about Jesus. All of our works, when we're in Christ, when Christ is in our hearts, all of our works are Christ's works. And therefore, Jesus says, my father works until now, implying the whole time.

And I also work the whole time, the whole week. It's not about a day of worship so much as it is, are we in Christ with his works or our works? And that's the question that the clock presents to us. It's a choice.

Do we have man's works or do we enter the ark of protection in the last days through the Sabbath, which is representing Christ's works? Now, in the world, especially in these last days, we see how man's works are forming. And they're coming to a conclusion. And there's really a great conflict between man's works and God's works.

Man's works are represented in the philosophy of the world, say, the United Nations. If you summarize it into one word, it would be tolerance. United Nations says, tolerate everything.

All religions, it's fine. Come in, no problem. If you want to change your gender, identify as something else, no problem.

We love everybody, tolerate everything. And this philosophy is coming to a head at the end of the world, just like in Noah's day. After 600 years of Noah's life, now after 6,000 years, man's ways, his works are coming to a conclusion.

And we can see that it's this contrast. And it doesn't work with man's ways. See, man, the slogan of the United Nations is to achieve peace and security.

So they want to achieve it using tolerance. Accept everything, everybody, whatever you believe, no matter how crazy it might be. It doesn't matter.

But God says, no, repent. He wants us to repent, which is just a choice to choose his ways, his works, and not our own. And when we do, we come by faith into the rest of Christ, into his ark of safety, into his security.

So there's this contrast between man's peace and security. Oh, if we're just embracing of every ideology and we don't complain, then we can have peace and security in the world. Jesus says, come to me, all you who labor and are heavy laden.

I will give you that rest and security. Yes, amen. There's the peace and the protective wall of security in the ark.

All signs represented here. So at the door is the judge who stands and he says, what is your choice? And so we need to make that choice. We need to decide.

We need to stand for Christ's works or we may choose man's works. Unfortunately, even in the church, we have brought in in ways we don't even understand. We've brought in the mentality of the tolerate everything that the United Nations promotes.

For example, there's, you know, there's this reluctance to speak about something that might offend someone. You might say, oh, don't say that. That might offend them. That would be like you're painting the painting.

Oh, I don't want to look at anything that's wrong. What kind of a picture will you get in the end? It's going to be terrible. If you never correct anything that's wrong, you won't have a good picture in the end.

And we are Christ's picture to the world. We represent Christ. We are his artwork.

Therefore, he wants to correct us. And many times he does that even through human agencies. So we should be open to receiving his rebuke when necessary and not feel like we're too good to have the rebuke.

And this is the problem with the world's philosophy. The world says you're good. You're fine.

No problem. Sin? Don't tell me about sin. But God says you're bad.

He says you need to repent and change your works. But we don't change our works on our own. We change our works by choosing his works.

And then his works come out. So in our hearts, we're bad. And when we recognize that and we live understanding that we are not good people, then we remember that we're dependent on Jesus.

And that, in the commandments even, the very beginning of the commandments, I'll close with this thought. In Exodus 20. And God spake all these words saying, first thing that he says, he's going to list off all of the commandments.

First thing he says is, I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. And then he starts with the commands after that. But he says, you are in bondage.

Egypt represented bondage, the bondage in sin. And he said, I am the one that brought you out of that bondage. And therefore, all the 10 commandments should be followed.

But those are followed in Christ. And when we understand that relationship that we have with sin, we are sinners. And it's only Christ that does the good works, that follows the commandments.

He was the only one that was good. And when we have that perspective, it changes our whole relationship with each other. So it's our choice to accept his invitation to come out of bondage and into his rest.

So I invite you to stand with me, if that is your desire, and accept his invitation to enter his rest. All right, let's pray. Dear Father in heaven, we thank you for your instruction from your word.

And we thank you for the rest that you have given to us in Christ. And even in these end times, you show us that your rest is still available. And you invite us to come into your ark, your ark of safety and peace.

It is in Christ to separate ourselves from the world and the ways of the world. And Father, I just ask for each one of us, for all of your children, wherever they might be in the world, that you will reach out to them in their hearts just now and draw them into your presence. That each of your children may experience your rest.

And your peace, a peace that the world cannot provide nor understand. We thank you and we love you. And we look forward to seeing you soon, as the sign shows.

And we pray these things in the name of Jesus Christ and he who was wounded for all of our transgressions. Thank you for your salvation, for bringing us out of the house of bondage. Amen.

Thank you. Next week we'll talk more about the next part of the sign, where Jesus is baptized.