| FAQs: After Secret Church 13 Posted: 29 Mar 2013 10:55 PM PDT Thank you to the LifeWay team for everything you did to make this simulcast possible! We are grateful for your partnership in bringing Secret Church: Heaven, Hell, and the End of the World to churches and small groups worldwide! We are also grateful for each simulcast host who made Secret Church available in your home or church. Over 63,000 people joined together for a time of in-depth Bible study and prayer for the persecuted church in 50 US States, 6 Canadian Provinces, and over 50 countries! This would not be possible without you! Now that the simulcast is over, you may have a few questions. Hopefully we can answer some of the most frequently asked questions here. If you have additional questions or need help with something else, leave a comment on this post or send us a message through our website. Can I purchase a Secret Church 13 DVD or watch it online?
If you were unable to join us for the simulcast or would like to go back through the teaching segments again, DVDs, CDs, and study guides are available for pre-order in our online store. We will begin shipping them in approximately 4 weeks. The free online version of these files (audio and video) will be available in our Resource Library in approximately 4 weeks. You can either watch or listen online or download them to your computer. I missed some of the answers on Friday night. Where can I find them?
All of the answers can be found on our website. You can download the blank and filled in study guides by clicking "Materials" under "Part 1″ of Secret Church: Heaven, Hell, and the End of the World in the Resource Library. We took up an offering Friday night. Where do we send it?
You can give online or you can mail your offering to: Radical
5511 Highway 280 South
Suite 215
Birmingham, AL 35242 Please make your check payable to "Radical" and note "SC 13 Offering" in the memo line. We ask that you please do not send cash. 100% of your offering goes toward helping the persecuted church. How can I learn about future Secret Church gatherings?
Sign up for our Secret Church email list on the home page of the Secret Church website. We'll let you know as information about dates, ticket sales, and simulcast information become available. (And we promise not to flood your inbox!) You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook. When is the next Secret Church? What is the topic?
The next Secret Church will be sometime in the Spring of 2014. The exact date has not been announced yet. If you would like to be notified about future Secret Church gatherings, sign up here. Watch our website, Facebook, and Twitter for announcements once the details are finalized. Pastor David mentioned that Secret Church has been translated into other languages. Where can I find those?
We currently have Secret Church and other sermon series available in six languages in our Resource Library: Arabic, Hindi, Indonesian, Mandarin, Russian, and Spanish. Click on the "language" toolbar at the top right of the page to select the language you are looking for. We will also have resources in Farsi, French, Vietnamese, Amharic, and Thai online soon. As additional resources become available, we will add them to our website. I want to know more about the Hui. Where can I learn more?
Please join us in praying for the Hui during the month of April. A 32-Day Prayer Guide is also available for FREE here. You can also learn more about the Hui at the Pray for the Hui blog and by following @Pray4Hui. Where can I find the music from tonight’s Secret Church?
Two of the songs that the worship team sang tonight—”Prayer for the Hui” and “Emmanuel’s Land”—are from a NEW EP from Brook Hills Worship Team called Emmanuel’s Land. You can purchase it on iTunes. I heard that the simulcast will be available for 30 days. How do I watch it?
Yes! The simulcast will be available in its entirety through April 29 at 11:59pm CDT. Simply log in to your simulcast account and watch part or all of it again. If you’d like to watch for the first time, you can still register here. If you have questions or need additional technical help, contact LifeWay by email or by calling 866.713.3512.
We want to hear your story!
We would love for you to share what you experienced and learned by being part of Secret Church 13. You can share your story on the Secret Church website. |
| SC 13: The Book of Revelation Posted: 29 Mar 2013 09:52 PM PDT  The final section on Revelation covers the following 3 questions and 7 conclusions.
Three Controversial Questions from Revelation: 1. What does this book teach and why do we have it? 2. What is the millennium and when will it happen? 3. What is the tribulation and who will experience it? Seven Critical Conclusions From Revelation: 1. God is sovereign. 2. Satan is subordinate. 3. Our God wins. 4. We must see the world in all its deception. 5. We must see the Christ in all His glory. 6. We must see the church in all her beauty. 7. We must see our lives in proper perspective. |
| SC 13: The Hope of Heaven Posted: 29 Mar 2013 09:52 PM PDT 
A few passages and quotes on the believer’s hope of heaven: “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Behold, the dwelling place of God is with man. He will dwell with them, and they will be his people, and God himself will be with them as their God. He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away." – Revelation 21:1-4 “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” – Revelation 21:1-2 "The man who is about to sail for Australia or New Zealand as a settler, is naturally anxious to know something about his future home, its climate, its employments, its inhabitants, its ways, its customs. All these are subjects of deep interest to him. You are leaving the land of your nativity, you are going to spend the rest of your life in a new hemisphere. It would be strange indeed if you did not desire information about your new abode. Now surely, if we hope to dwell forever in that 'better country, even a heavenly one,' we ought to seek all the knowledge we can get about it. Before we go to our eternal home we should try to become acquainted with it." – J.C. Ryle "It becomes us to spend this life only as a journey toward heaven … to which we should subordinate all other concerns of life. Why should we labor for or set our hearts on anything else, but that which is our proper end and true happiness?" – Jonathan Edwards "In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth and declared it 'good.' God does not surrender this good creation to Satan but wins it back through the blood of Christ, which frees creation's rulers from the sentence of death for sin." – Russell Moore "If I find in myself a desire which no experience in this world can satisfy, the most probable explanation is that I was made for another world." – C.S. Lewis |
| SC 13: The Final Judgment Posted: 29 Mar 2013 08:16 PM PDT  Though it’s not a popular teaching, the Bible speaks repeatedly of God’s judgment and the reality of the coming judgment for all men. Here are several passages and quotes that pastor David used in this section:
"When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left." – Matthew 25:31-33 "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?' And then will I declare to them, 'I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.'" – Matthew 7:21-23 “For God will bring every deed into judgment, with every secret thing, whether good or evil.” – Ecclesiastes 12:14 "There are few things stressed more strongly in the Bible than the reality of God's work as Judge." – J.I. Packer "In the day that we stand before our Master and Maker, it will not matter how many people on earth knew our name, how many called us great, and how many considered us fools. It will not matter whether schools and hospitals were named after us, whether our estate was large or small, whether our funeral drew ten thousand or no one. It will not matter what the newspapers or history books said or didn't say. What will matter is one thing and one thing only—what the Master thinks of us." – Randy Alcorn |
| SC 13: The Horror of Hell Posted: 29 Mar 2013 08:15 PM PDT  Pastor David covered “The Horror of Hell” in the next section. Hell is an increasingly unpopular doctrine, but one that we must hold to and proclaim as part of our Christian witness.
Here are a few passages and quotations from this sobering section: “And if anyone’s name was not found written in the book of life, he was thrown into the lake of fire.” – Revelation 20:15 “They will suffer the punishment of eternal destruction, away from the presence of the Lord and from the glory of his might.” – 2 Thessalonians 1:9 "All the language that strikes terror into our hearts—weeping and gnashing of teeth, outer darkness, the worm, the fire, gehenna, the great gulf fixed—is all directly taken from our Lord's teaching. It is from Jesus Christ that we learn the doctrine of eternal punishment." – J.I. Packer "If there is any truth in Scripture at all, this is true—that those who stubbornly refuse to submit to the Gospel, and to love and obey Jesus Christ incur at the Last Advent an infinite and irreparable loss. They pass into a night on which no morning dawns." – James Denney "Who are we to pass judgment on the justice of the decision of the All-Wise? Who are we to say what is consistent or inconsistent with God's righteousness? Sin has so enfeebled our power of righteous judgment, so darkened our understanding, so dulled our conscience, so perverted our wills, so corrupted our hearts, that we are quite incompetent to decide. We are ourselves so infected and affected by sin that we are altogether incapable of estimating its due merits. Imagine a company of criminals passing judgment on the equity and goodness of the law which had condemned them!" – A.W. Pink "Evangelicals are often apologetic about the biblical view of retribution. They say that they wish that what the Bible says about the punishment of sinners is not true, that they find it hard to accept this doctrine emotionally, but that because the Bible teaches it they are forced to believe it. This type of thinking is understandable, given our human frailty and inability to fully understand God's ways. We do not see the seriousness of sin as strongly as God sees it. But many today seem to be proud that their hearts rebel against the judgment of God. The message they convey to an outsider is that they think God is wrong and unfair, but that's what he is going to do, so they reluctantly include it in their statement of faith." – Ajith Fernando |
| SC 13: The Return of Christ Posted: 29 Mar 2013 08:14 PM PDT  The return of Christ is sure and a foundational Christian doctrine. As pastor David notes, it will not be like His first coming:
He came the first time in humility to provide salvation; He will come the second time in glory to execute judgment. George Ladd on the timing of Christ’s second coming followed by several relevant passages: "The prophets were little interested in chronology, and the future was always viewed as imminent …. The Old Testament prophets blended the near and the distant perspectives so as to form a single canvas. Biblical prophecy is not primarily three-dimensional but two; it has height and breadth but is little concerned about depth, i.e., the chronology of future events …. The distant is viewed through the transparency of the immediate. It is true that the early church lived in expectancy of the return of the Lord, and it is the nature of biblical prophecy to make it possible for every generation to live in expectancy of the end." – George Ladd “And just as it is appointed for man to die once, and after that comes judgment, so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.” – Hebrews 9:27-28 "Then will appear in heaven the sign of the Son of Man, and then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And he will send out his angels with a loud trumpet call, and they will gather his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other." – Matthew 24:30-31 Now concerning the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ and our being gathered together to him, we ask you, brothers, not to be quickly shaken in mind or alarmed, either by a spirit or a spoken word, or a letter seeming to be from us, to the effect that the day of the Lord has come. Let no one deceive you in any way. For that day will not come, unless the rebellion comes first, and the man of lawlessness is revealed, the son of destruction, who opposes and exalts himself against every so-called god or object of worship, so that he takes his seat in the temple of God, proclaiming himself to be God. Do you not remember that when I was still with you I told you these things? And you know what is restraining him now so that he may be revealed in his time. For the mystery of lawlessness is already at work. Only he who now restrains it will do so until he is out of the way. And then the lawless one will be revealed, whom the Lord Jesus will kill with the breath of his mouth and bring to nothing by the appearance of his coming. The coming of the lawless one is by the activity of Satan with all power and false signs and wonders, and with all wicked deception for those who are perishing, because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. – 2 Thessalonians 2:1-10 |
| SC 13: The Resurrection of the Dead Posted: 29 Mar 2013 07:04 PM PDT The believer’s resurrection of the dead and indeed the gospel itself is based on whether or not Jesus rose from the dead. Based on Christ’s bodily resurrection, believer’s have the sure hope that they too will be resurrected. “Beloved, we are God’s children now, and what we will be has not yet appeared; but we know that when he appears we shall be like him, because we shall see him as he is. – 1 John 3:2 Pastor David points out that our bodies will by physical, and they will be like Christ’s (though we won’t be God!). Here are several quotes on this reality, the first one by Joni Erickson Tada, a quadriplegic: "I hope in some way I can take my wheelchair to heaven. With my new glorified body I will stand up on resurrected legs, and I will be next to the Lord Jesus. And I will feel those nail prints in his hands, and I will say, 'Thank you, Jesus!' He will know I mean it, because he will recognize me from the inner sanctum of sharing in the fellowship of his sufferings. He will see that I was one who identified with him in the sharing of his sufferings, so my gratitude will not be hollow. And then I will say, 'Lord Jesus, do you see that wheelchair over there? Well, you were right. When you put me in it, it was a lot of trouble. But the weaker I was in that thing, the harder I leaned on you. And the harder I leaned on you, the stronger I discovered you to be. I do not think I would ever have known the glory of your grace were it not for the weakness of that wheelchair. So thank you, Lord Jesus, for that. Now, if you like, you can send that thing off to hell.'" – Joni Erickson Tada "Christianity is not a platonic religion that regards material things as mere shadows of reality, which will be sloughed off as soon as possible. Not the mere immortality of the soul, but rather the resurrection of the body and renewal of all creation is the hope of the Christian faith." – John Piper (on Romans 8:23-25)
"[The resurrection of the body] is the Christian's brightest hope. Many believers make a mistake when they long to die and long for Heaven. Those things may be desirable, but they are not the ultimate for the saints. The saints in Heaven are perfectly free from sin and, so far as they are capable of it, are perfectly happy. But a disembodied spirit never can be perfect until it is reunited to its body. God made man not pure spirit but body and spirit, and the spirit alone will never be content until it sees its physical frame raised to its own condition of holiness and glory. Think not that our longings here below are not shared in by the saints in Heaven. They do not groan so far as any pain can be, but they long with greater intensity than you and I for the 'adoption … the redemption of our bodies.' People have said there is no faith in Heaven, and no hope. They know not what they say—in Heaven faith and hope have their fullest swing and their brightest sphere, for glorified saints believe in God's promise and hope for the resurrection of the body." – Charles Spurgeon |
| SC 13: The Intermediate State Posted: 29 Mar 2013 06:41 PM PDT  The second topic of Secret Church 13 is The Intermediate State. So what is it?
The intermediate state refers to the condition of people between their bodily death and their bodily resurrection. Paul’s words in 2 Corinthians 5:1-10 help us in terms of how to think about the intermediate state: “For we know that if the tent that is our earthly home is destroyed, we have a building from God, a house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens. For in this tent we groan, longing to put on our heavenly dwelling, if indeed by putting it on we may not be found naked. For while we are still in this tent, we groan, being burdened—not that we would be unclothed, but that we would be further clothed, so that what is mortal may be swallowed up by life. He who has prepared us for this very thing is God, who has given us the Spirit as a guarantee. So we are always of good courage. We know that while we are at home in the body we are away from the Lord, for we walk by faith, not by sight. Yes, we are of good courage, and we would rather be away from the body and at home with the Lord. So whether we are at home or away, we make it our aim to please him. For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, so that each one may receive what is due for what he has done in the body, whether good or evil.” –2 Cor 5:1-10 |
| SC 13: Cleaving Unto Death Posted: 29 Mar 2013 06:38 PM PDT Voices from church history on clinging to Christ until death: "No one makes us afraid or leads us into captivity as we have set our faith on Jesus. For though we are beheaded, and crucified, and exposed to beasts and chains and fire and all other forms of torture, it is plain that we do not forsake the confession of our faith, but the more things of this kind which happen to us the more are there others who become believers … through the name of Jesus." — Justin Martyr "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the Church." – Tertullian "Never did the church so much prosper and so truly thrive as when she was baptized in the blood. The ship of the church never sails so gloriously along as when the bloody spray of her martyrs falls on her deck. We must suffer and we must die, if we are ever to conquer this world for Christ." – Charles Spurgeon "We do not know the value of Christ, if we will not cleave to Him unto death!" – Robert Murray McCheyne |
| Secret Church 13: Heaven, Hell, & The End of the World Posted: 29 Mar 2013 05:35 PM PDT  Secret Church 13 has arrived, and what you’ll be seeing in the next few posts is a small taste of the night. If you are participating via simulcast and you have questions, call 866.713.3512 or email secretchurch@lifeway.com.
I’ll be highlighting some of the main points, including some quotes pastor David Platt uses in his teaching on this year’s topic: Heaven, Hell, & The End of the World. Follow us on Twitter tonight and throughout the year: @Secret_Church. We’re using the hashtag #SC13 for tonight’s gathering, and for the answers to the Study Guide blanks we’ll be using #SCanswers. Here are the topics that will covered tonight: The Fragility of Life and the Finality of Death
The Intermediate State
The Return of Christ
The Resurrection of the Dead
The Final Judgment
The Horror of Hell
The Hope of Heaven
Three Controversial Questions in Revelation (purpose, millenium, tribulation)
Seven Critical Conclusions from Revelation Pastor David is beginning by reminding us of the danger of being blinded by temporal things and numbed by trivialities. We desperately need to contemplate the eternal. A.W. Tozer has put it this way: "Let no one apologize for the powerful emphasis Christianity lays upon the doctrine of the world to come. Right there lies its immense superiority to everything else within the whole sphere of human thought or experience. When Christ arose from death and ascended into heaven He established forever three important facts; namely, that this world has been condemned to ultimate dissolution, that the human spirit persists beyond the grave and that there is indeed a world to come …. The church is constantly being tempted to accept this world as her home, and sometimes she has listened to the blandishments of those who would woo her away and use her for their own ends. But if she is wise she will consider that she stands in the valley between the mountain peaks of eternity past and eternity to come. The past is gone forever and the present is passing as swift as the shadow on the sundial of Ahaz. Even if the earth should continue a million years, not one of us could stay to enjoy it. We do well to think of the long tomorrow." |
