{"id":100,"date":"2018-11-06T16:35:10","date_gmt":"2018-11-07T00:35:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/migrate.bettersermons.org\/?p=100"},"modified":"2020-06-01T11:41:03","modified_gmt":"2020-06-01T18:41:03","slug":"you-are-here","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/you-are-here\/","title":{"rendered":"You Are Here"},"content":{"rendered":"
You Are Here<\/span><\/div>\n

\".\"<\/p>\n\n\n\n
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Key Passage<\/strong>:\u00a0II Peter 1:19:\u00a0We have also a more sure word of prophecy (KJV). We have the words of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts (NIV).<\/i>Key Thought<\/strong>: God\u2019s followers can have confidence in what the Bible tells us about our place in the grand prophetic sweep of history and the nearness of Jesus\u2019 coming.<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n

Introduction:<\/b>\u00a0You have an important meeting with a VP; the noon appointment is at an upscale restaurant in a mall. You drive 200 miles and arrive at this huge complex 15 minutes early. But there are three levels of stores, escalators, branches going off in all directions. You get to the mall with about 15 minutes to spare, park your car, and go in. And this place is\u00a0huge<\/em>! Three levels of stores and escalators and branches going off in all directions. Fast-food restaurants, a theater, pushcart entrepreneurs with their necktie displays. You realize there\u2019s no way you\u2019re going to find your appointment place\u2014not with two miles of busy hallways to navigate. Then you see that welcome sign: a map or \u201clegend\u201d which shows where every store is, every escalator and restroom and eatery. And three more wonderful words:\u00a0You Are Here.<\/i><\/p>\n

Reality:<\/b>\u00a0When you’re on a trip and looking at a map, it doesn’t do any good unless you know where\u00a0you<\/i>\u00a0are! Which off-ramp you take depends on which freeway you’re on. You’ve got to know where you are before you can proceed into the future.<\/p>\n

Our Three Great Questions:<\/b><\/p>\n

1.\u00a0Where did I come from?
\n2.\u00a0What am I doing here?
\n3.\u00a0Where am I going?<\/p>\n

These three questions focus on our place in human history.\u00a0You Are Here<\/i>\u00a0is core to our very identity as God\u2019s people.<\/p>\n

No Destination . . . No Problem!<\/b>\u00a0If a person goes to the mall just to window-shop and kill three hours, you wouldn\u2019t need a map. \u201cYou Are Here\u201d? \u201cWho cares? I’m not going anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

Literature Illustration:<\/b>\u00a0The Alice of\u00a0Alice in Wonderland<\/i>\u00a0asks the Cat: \u201cWhere should I go from here?\u201d \u201cWhere do you want to get to?\u201d \u201cI don\u2019t really care.\u201d \u201cThen it doesn’t matter which way you go,\u201d the Cat says. Life is like that. If you don’t care where you’re going, then knowing where you are right now is no big deal. You can simply live your seventy years and pile up more toys than your neighbor before you die, like it says on the bumper sticker. But most of us want to know: where am I now? The answer to that tells you how to get to tomorrow\u2014and to all your tomorrows.<\/p>\n

God Is in the Map-Making Business.<\/b>\u00a0(Or NavStar). He’s not a God of confusion, secrets, or surprises. He wants His children to know both who they are and where they are. And here\u2019s a map we should pay attention to:<\/p>\n

II Peter 1:19:\u00a0We have also a more sure word of prophecy (KJV). We have the words of the prophets made more certain, and you will do well to pay attention to it, as to a light shining in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts (NIV).<\/i><\/p>\n

A Map of Centuries
\n<\/b>
\nAdventists are familiar with the great prophetic image of Daniel 2, where Nebuchadnezzar had a dream of a great image staring down at him: head of gold, chest and arms of silver, belly and thighs of brass, legs of iron, feet of part iron, part clay. And then the great stone coming down, smashing the statue, filling the whole earth. God\u2019s servant, Daniel, was called in to interpret the dream after the king forgot it.<\/p>\n

Daniel wisely credits God with sovereignty and a desire to reveal truth to His earthly subjects. \u201cGod changes times and seasons; he sets up kings and deposes them. He gives wisdom to the wise and knowledge to the discerning. He reveals deep and hidden things; he knows what lies in darkness, and light dwells with Him<\/i>\u201d (v. 21, 22). \u201cThere is a God in heaven who reveals mysteries<\/i>\u201d (v. 28).<\/p>\n

Accuracy:<\/b>\u00a0Daniel 2 is one of the wide-screen, digital Dolby maps of all time, telling in a few thrilling verses the past and future history of the world. Four juggernaut kingdoms, one after the other, with global reigns spanning more than 1,000 years, both B.C. and A.D.<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0Babylon
\n2.\u00a0Medo-Persia
\n3.\u00a0Greece
\n4.\u00a0Rome
\n5.\u00a0Mixed nations of Europe<\/p>\n

Reminder:<\/b>\u00a0this \u201cmap\u201d was given during the reign of Babylon\u2019s king, the\u00a0first<\/i>\u00a0of the kingdoms. This isn\u2019t Monday-morning quarterbacking: this is tantamount to predicting the Super Bowl winner in the year 2050.<\/p>\n

Can We Have Confidence in This Map?\u00a0<\/b>
\nThe four kingdoms rose up and crashed down just as predicted. We’ve had the nations of Europe for many centuries. And in all that time, seven words of this prophecy\/map have ruled the pages of history: \u201cThey Shall Not Cleave One To Another.\u201d<\/p>\n

Adventist Broadcaster Henry Feyerabend:<\/b>\u00a0His Daniel study guide outlines the intermarrying schemes of virtually every single monarch and royal heir and king and queen and prince and princess in all of Europe. The \u201cmingling of seed\u201d in Europe, for the purpose of political unity, has been tried for the last millennium without success.<\/p>\n

Love Or War:<\/b>\u00a0Feyerabend also describes the seven major political or military attempts to unite Europe. Charlemagne, Charles V, Louis XIV, Napoleon, Kaiser Wilhelm, Adolph Hitler, and today\u2019s continuing move toward the European Common Market. It’s never happened, and it never will, says this global map in Daniel.<\/p>\n

You Are Here:<\/b>\u00a0Daniel said to Nebuchadnezzar, \u201cYou Are Here.\u201d \u201cYou are this head of gold, O King. Here’s your place in history.\u201d But this dream has a similar message for us.\u00a0You Are Here<\/i>. Here at the end. Here in the image\u2019s\u00a0toes<\/i>, just moments before the stone cut out without hands descends from above and shatters the world\u2019s empires and human endeavors. The stone signifying the Second Coming Jesus. We are in Mile 26 of the Marathon; it\u2019s two minutes before midnight. If this was a mall map, we\u2019d find that warning, \u201cYou Are Here,\u201d at the very far end of the mall. Right at the exit doors leading to something glorious that is beyond our imagination.<\/p>\n

Appeal:<\/b>\u00a0God tells us so that we will know. He tells us to give us confidence. But most of all, He tells us so that we will\u00a0move<\/i>. There\u2019s no more time to wander aimlessly looking in the shop windows. Right now\u2019s the time to take up our maps and finish our journey.
\n______________________________<\/p>\n

Submitted by David B. Smith. Better Sermons \u00a9 2005-2008. Click here for\u00a0<\/span>usage guidelines<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You Are Here Key Passage:\u00a0II Peter 1:19:\u00a0We have also a more sure word of prophecy (KJV). We have the words of the prophets made more certain, and you will do …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=100"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":101,"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/100\/revisions\/101"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bettersermons.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}