Prayer Works Morning Devotion: April 2, 2025

"Readying Our Hearts for Resurrection Sunday"

"The Signs Of The Times And The End Of The Age"

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Good morning, family, praise God for a new day. We are in Luke 20 today, but before we do Luke Chapter 20, I just wanted to do a quick recap for those of you that have been following along.  

You know that we've been doing the trek of Jesus's walk into Jerusalem before his crucifixion and we started off in Luke Chapter 19, which began with Jesus seeing Zacchaeus in the tree and telling him to come down and having dinner at his house.  

We went into the parable of the minas, we went into the triumphal entry, which was when Jesus came into Jerusalem riding the donkey, and then when Jesus saw Jerusalem, how he wept over it. 

And then we saw Jesus cleanse the temple of all the sales and the goings on and the money making that was going on there. And then in Luke, chapter 20.

We saw Jesus's authority questioned by those around him, especially the Sadducees and the Pharisees trying to determine who gave him the right to do the things that he was doing. 

And then we went into the parable of the vine dresser. And then we went into the Pharisees asking and testing whether or not it was lawful to pay taxes to Caesars, and then in the same chapter we spoke about the Sadducees, who were questioning about the resurrection even though they didn't believe in it. 

And then the question came up about how David can call his descendant Lord and Jesus eloquently answered that. And then finally, he told the disciples to beware of the scribes. Then we moved into Chapter 21, which is where we are currently this week and we started the week off with the widows mites.  

And then yesterday Pastor Zee spoke about Jesus predicting the destruction of the temple, and today we will be discussing the signs of the time and the end of the age, but before we do that brothers and sisters, let us go to the Lord in prayer and gain wisdom and understanding in these passages.  

Heavenly Father, we come before your throne this day to thank you for your mercy and your grace in our lives.  

We thank you that you've gotten us up on this day, this day that is unique to all of us because it is the first time we are walking in this day and it will be the last time that we walk in this day. 

And all things that you have prescribed to occur on this day will once and for all be done, and so we are grateful that you are using us. We are grateful that you have us in your bosom, Father.

We are blessed to be here on this call this morning to receive a word from you that we will be able to carry with us throughout this day.  

And so I thank you, Father, for using me to be able to bring this word forth that you have placed on my heart Father, I pray that you move me aside and allow your words through your Holy Spirit to speak to those that are on this call and to those that will listen to the call at a later date. 

I thank you for the privilege and the honor, and I thank you, Father, that you have blessed me to be able to be here now. And so I pray that your word touches the hearts and the minds of those that are on this call.  

And I pray that your will be done on Earth as it is in heaven. We pray praise and thanksgiving, we exalt you Father among all things in this world and in the days and weeks and months to come. Thank you, Father, for your grace and your mercy. We pray this and thank you in Jesus name, Amen.  

All right so as I said, we are going to talk about the signs of the times and the end of the age and we are in Luke chapter 21. And I will read this section 1st and so it reads from Chapter 7, I'm sorry verse 7 through verse 19.  

That's what I'll be handling today. And it reads so they asked him, and this is the disciples and this mind you is after uh the disciples were admiring the temple, which Jesus told them that every stone would be thrown down and not one stone be left upon another, and so they asked him teacher, when will these things be?  

And what will be the sign there will be when these things are about to take place, and I'm reading out of the new King James version, by the way. And it says here in verse 8 and he said take heed that you not be deceived for many will come in my name.  

I am he and the time has drawn near. Therefore do not go out after them. But when you hear of wars and commotions do not be terrified, for these things must come to pass first. But the end will not come immediately. 

 Then he said to them, nation will rise against nation and Kingdom against Kingdom, and there will be great earthquakes in various places and famines and pestilences, and there will be fearful sites and great signs from heaven.  

But before all these things, they will lay their hands on you and persecute you, delivering you up to the synagogues and prisons. You will be brought before kings and rulers for my namesake but it will turn out for you as an occasion for a testimony.  

Therefore, settle it in your hearts not to meditate beforehand on what you will answer for I will give you a mouth and wisdom which all your adversaries will not be able to contradict or resist.  

You will be betrayed even by parents and brothers, relatives and friends and they will put some of. You to death. And you will be hated by all for my namesake. But not a hair on your head shall be lost. 

By your patience possess your souls. Oh, Jesus gave them a lot of food for thought as I was going through this, I counted 12 things that Jesus said would happen. And he started off with something that we all need to be aware of, especially in this day and age and this time and season that we're in.  

And the first thing he said was do not be deceived. Now we can see in the world today that there are so many deceptions. So much is going on, things that we read or see on the news that it's flipping right and wrong on its head.  

The lie is becoming the truth and the truth is considered a lie. And we're going to see that as the days and weeks and months go forward that this is only going to get worse and especially in the church, you know, we see pastors in recent weeks and months falling because of deception.  

Falling because of unconfessed sins. You would say that in most cases you have in the entering of the church, wolves in sheep's clothing, pastors and prophetic teachers that pretend to be for God, but they're really for themselves.  

And then the second thing he said was the nation will rise against the nation. Now again, are we in that time, because when we look at what's going on today, I mean we have the war Ukraine and Russia.  

And we also have some tensions between the US and Europe, right. So these two lend themselves to exactly what Jesus was telling the disciples even then, I mean, we know that great destruction came to the temple in the time of the disciples. 

But fast forward 2000 years and we've had all kinds of wars and it's not over yet. And so these are all signs that we need to be paying attention to. Another thing that he mentioned was great earthquakes in one place after another.  

And we don't have to look far and rack our brains to figure out when was the last time we had an earthquake. This past Friday we had an earthquake in Myanmar and in Thailand, and we're hearing estimates of 10,000 or more being killed.  

My wife and I were watching some of the news footage and saw where a skyscraper that was in Thailand collapsed, and they're fearing that all of the workers that were building this skyscraper were lost.  

So again, another prediction that Jesus made mention of also then he mentioned famines. And you know, we can see even through men's ignorance on hoarding and keeping food in storehouses and controlling you know the distribution of food that around globe there are shortages.  

The damage to the earth itself with fossil fuels and all of the pollution, you know it is destroying the ground. And so in some places, like, for example, Ethiopia people millions of people are starving.  

Millions of people don't have food and here now in this new environment that we're in, tariffs have been placed against nations that we the US import from and that's going to cause prices to rise, and so will you be able to afford food, hence famines. 

Then great signs from heaven was another statement that Jesus made. And recently we we saw something that we've not seen before and it was alignments of all of the planets and if you were in an area that were able to see this and witness this witness this for yourself,  

this is something that hasn't happened, and you know you've also seen blood red moons, which you know, that's something that doesn't happen every day as well. And so these are far from the signs, obviously that Jesus is expressing because we know that the signs that in the final days are going to be supernatural, really supernatural.  

And so these are just signs that are leading up to that that we can feed today for ourselves and know that these are truths that Jesus is speaking and then persecution you mentioned. 

The Christian persecution, persecution for the name of Jesus. We know that in places like Asia, Africa, Iran. Christians are being persecuted and in some cases even killed. I looked up on the Internet and found a company, a Christian organization, I should say, and it's called open doors world and or open doors.  

And their World watch list shows that one in seven Christians are persecuted worldwide. One in five Christians are persecuted in Africa alone and two in five are persecuted in Asia regularly.  

And so we here in the US have been privileged and blessed to be able to profess Jesus openly. But we also know that that is slowly changing those freedoms are slowly being taken away.  

I know even on my job you don't talk about politics and you don't talk about religion because that could get you fired. So we know that these are things that are happening as I speak then also Jesus talked about being delivered up to synagogues and prisons.  

Now in our current day, we may not be delivered up to synagogues, but certainly those that are being persecuted are put in prison.

And we know that the delivering up to the synagogues that that really happened during the disciples time, we know in you know in acts those things that Paul and his believers his followers experienced was true.  

We know Peter also suffered and we think about those, especially in the book of Acts that were killed and how each and every one of the disciples met their death for their beliefs.

We also know, too, that Jesus mentioned in this passage that you would be brought before kings and rulers just for believing in him and again we look at the disciples lives back. 

Then in the book of Matthew and in Mark, and also when we look at the book of Acts, you can see where these things came to pass that the disciples were delivered up and they gave testimony which brought the word to those kings and rulers.  

In our time we may be facing governors and governments, because especially here in this region of the world, we don't have kings, right. But we do have rulers and we will be given the mouth, if you will, to speak to the truth at the prescribed time that God has laid before his people. 

And we know that, as I said that this has happened during the disciples time and again, it will continue to happen. He also says in this passage that you will be betrayed by those closest to you.  

Now think about this. You know that your family members who you may live with in the final days, as we get closer to the end, may be the ones that send you to prison may be the ones for saving their own selves from the justice system that will not be justice, but injustice. 

Saving you, saving them rather from getting themselves caught up that they will push you into prison and possibly even put you to death as Jesus says in the following statement that some of you will be put to death and imagine just being put to death by your own family members for believing in Jesus.  

Then it says you'll be hated also for the name of Jesus, and we saw in in the book of Acts again thinking about those that spoke about Jesus and spoke about the fact that the Jews had put Jesus to death, how they became so enraged that I think I remember Steven giving a testimony that he was stoned to death.  

But in the same statement Jesus gives a consolation and he says that, but not a hair on your head shall be lost. He goes on to say that by your patience, possess your souls and I have to look that up in different versions to see how it was read.  

And that was King James version and in the NIV it says stand firm and you will win life. And finally, the contemporary English version of that famed statement says you will be saved by being faithful to me. 

In Luke Chapter 12, Jesus was speaking to a crowd And he said in verses 54 through 56. When you see a cloud rising in the West immediately you say it's going to rain and it does. And when the South wind blows, you say it is going to be hot and it is.  

Hypocrites you know how to interpret the appearance of the Earth and the sky. How is it you don't know how to interpret this present time? Family this time is not just for the times of the disciples, but it's for the times that we are in now.  

All twelve of these statements of truth that Jesus spoke to his disciples have happened, are happening and will continue to happen right through the end of the age. Let us not be ignorant of the time that we are in.  

We know that God revealed to Ezekiel in Ezekiel chapter 34:11-13. Where he says for thus says the Lord God, indeed. I myself will search for my sheep and seek them out as the Shepherd seeks out his flock on the day he is among his scattered sheep.  

So will I seek out my sheep and deliver them from all the places where they were scattered on a cloudy and dark day? And I will bring them out from the peoples and gather them from the countries and we'll bring them to their own land.  

I will feed them on the mountains of Israel, in the valleys and in all the inhabited places of the country. And I read this because this is a profound sign that many of us tend to overlook.  

We know that the Jews reinhabit their land in 1948. Family this is the generation that Jesus is speaking about when he was speaking to the disciples, he was speaking to them not only about the times that they were in, but this time that we are now in.  

We are that generation. We are in the end time. Jesus has revealed this to his disciples and to us so that we would have an understanding of the things that would take place not just in their time, but also to us, so that we would have discernment for identifying the signs of the times that we are in and the end of the age.  

Just remember the last thing though, that Jesus said here. You will be saved by being faithful to me. Be patient, be faithful and you will be saved. Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, we come before your throne again to give you thanks to give you praise, honor and glory, to exalt your holy name above all else in this world Father. 

Thank you for choosing us to be your disciples, your children, for guarding us in our state for loving us Father before we loved you. Thank you, Father that your mercies and your grace abound in our lives.  

We thank you that you've given us wisdom and discernment. We thank you that you give us your heart. We thank you that our hearts are not lonely hearts, but hearts of flesh that we are able to receive your word with thankful hearts.  

We thank you that you have blessed us this day to hear your word and we pray, Father, that your word stays with us, that we apply it, that we think about it, that we mull over it, Father, understanding that all these things that we are seeing now are not to be feared. 

But to be recognized for what they are and that we continue to look up and look for you and look for the return of your son Jesus in our lives to see him, to be with him, knowing that the end will come.  

We pray Father to do your will to do the work that you've set before us to do, to speak and testify according to your will and according to the things that you have done for us in our lives Father. 

We pray your blessings over your works that you do through us. And we ask to be used and be willing vessels molded by you for your purpose and your purpose only, and pray for all of those that are on the call today, asking your blessing to be in their lives, Father and touch each and everyone of them where they are.  

Bless them according to your will for their lives. Provide where there is need and its comfort, where peace is needed. I pray for your will to be done and pray now that you lead us not into temptation but deliver us from the evil one.  

We pray for your mercy to continuously abound in our lives. Thank you for the good health that you've provided for us. Thank you for the sustenance that you've given us. Thank you for the word and the daily bread that you provide.  

We give you all honor and glory, and we praise your holy name, thanking you in the mighty and matchless name of Jesus, we pray, Amen family. Thank you for being on the call today. We pray for God's peace, God's patience to be with you so that you will remain faithful and be saved.  

Don't let these things that you are hearing and seeing, it's their view because that's not what they're meant for. God covers those that love them. God will protect those that look to him and seek him first.  

So seek him family, look to him and he will be there to be found. Pray you have a blessed day. Go in peace, we love you. God bless you.