Category: Return of Jesus – Book
“The Same Way” of Christ’s Return
This is the 14th in a series of excerpts from What Every Christian Should Know About the Return of Jesus, released by High Street Press and available at Amazon.com.
In the last column, we explored several defining attributes of “this same Jesus” (Acts 1:11). Now, let’s consider what the angels may have meant when they told the apostles Jesus is returning “the same way” they witnessed his departure.
First, Jesus himself is coming.
When Jesus returns, he’s not sending a prophet, apostle, angel, cherub, hologram, selfie, MailChimp marketing blast, or any other substitute. He’s coming himself. Further, Jesus isn’t appearing as a theophany – a flame in a desert thorn bush, a pillar of cloud and fire, a rider on a blazing chariot-throne, or a voice in a whirlwind. He’s coming as the same resurrected Son of Man who ascended physically into heaven in the presence of his apostles (Acts 1:9).
The return of Jesus always is portrayed in personal terms. Jesus tells his disciples, “I will come again and take you to myself, so that where I am you may be also” (John 14:3).
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This Same Jesus
This is the 13th in a series of excerpts from What Every Christian Should Know About the Return of Jesus, released by High Street Press and available at Amazon.com.
Reading Acts 1, it’s hard to imagine the apostles’ thoughts as they gaze upward, watching Jesus ascend from the Mount of Olives and then vanish from view. Jesus had come unassumingly, born to a teenage mother in a Middle Eastern village. He lived his life humbly, refusing to be crowned king on numerous occasions, hiding his identity as Messiah until just the right moment, and then surrendering his life on a Roman cross.
Jesus’ resurrection three days later proved his messianic claims and sealed his identity as Lord and Christ (Acts 2:36). He culled dozens of disciples until there were only twelve close followers – one of them a betrayer, as Jesus well knew. And he sought to prepare them for just this moment, when he returned to the Father and passed the gospel torch to his newly commissioned apostles.
But now he’s gone, his glorified body rising into the air, enveloped in a heavenly cloud, to assume his place at the Father’s right hand. The apostles still have questions, doubts, and apprehensions. They aren’t ready to be left alone. And that’s how it must have felt – left alone – with Jesus bidding them farewell.
They know it isn’t quite like that. Jesus had assured them he would always be with them (Matt. 28:20). And he promised to send the Holy Spirit – another counselor, comforter, and advocate just like him. But would they really see him again? If so, how soon? And how would they carry on an earth-bound ministry with Jesus in heaven?
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Christ’s Second Coming in the Psalms
This is the 12th in a series of excerpts from What Every Christian Should Know About the Return of Jesus, released by High Street Press and available at Amazon.com.
The second coming of Christ often is linked with the moral struggle between God and his creatures. Psalm 2 is a good example. The psalmist describes the world’s rejection of God’s sovereignty, and then declares God’s purpose:
“I have installed my king on Zion, my holy mountain.” I will declare the LORD’s decree. He said to me, “You are my Son; today I have become your Father. Ask of me, and I will make the nations your inheritance and the ends of the earth your possession. You will break them with an iron scepter; you will shatter them like pottery.”
Ps. 2:6-9
God fully intends to respond to the nations’ rebellion against him. He installs his Son as king of the earth. Consequently, the kings of the earth are exhorted:
So now, kings, be wise; receive instruction, you judges of the earth. Serve the LORD with reverential awe and rejoice with trembling. Pay homage to the Son or he will be angry and you will perish in your rebellion, for his anger may ignite at any moment. All who take refuge in him are happy.
Ps. 2:10-12
Another prophecy of the second coming is Psalm 72, likely a coronation prayer used when one Davidic king dies and another comes to power. But it’s more than that. It looks forward to the ultimate Davidic king – Messiah – and his reign on earth. Messiah’s dominion is “from sea to sea” (v. 8). Kings and nations serve him (v. 11).
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He Will Judge the Nations
This is the 11th in a series of excerpts from What Every Christian Should Know About the Return of Jesus, released by High Street Press and available at Amazon.com.
The second coming of Jesus is implied in hundreds of Old Testament prophecies that center on future judgment of the world and a coming kingdom of righteousness. Jesus and the New Testament writers elevate these ancient prophecies and apply them to the unfinished but guaranteed future work of the Savior.
One challenge of messianic prophecies is their compressed view of the future. We see predictions of a Suffering Servant who is despised, rejected, and sacrificed for our sins (Isa. 53), along with visions of a Davidic king who comes in power, judging the world and setting things right (Ps. 110).
Are the Suffering Servant and Davidic king separate individuals, or are they one person conducting two major campaigns to redeem a sinful and fallen world?
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The Testimony of Angels
This is the 10th in a series of excerpts from What Every Christian Should Know About the Return of Jesus, released by High Street Press and available at Amazon.com.
Angels proclaim the return of Jesus in at least two New Testament passages. In the first, “two men in white clothes” tell the apostles Christ’s return is to be a mirror image of his ascension, which they have just witnessed. In the second, an angel flies high overhead, announcing to the earth’s inhabitants that God’s hour of judgment has come.
Acts 1:10-11 – While he was going, they were gazing into heaven, and suddenly two men in white clothes stood by them. They said, “Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking up into heaven? This same Jesus, who has been taken from you into heaven, will come in the same way that you have seen him going into heaven.”
Jesus has instructed his apostles to remain in Jerusalem until they receive the Father’s promise of the Holy Spirit. Thus empowered, they are to be Christ’s witnesses in Jerusalem, in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Then, Jesus ascends into heaven with a cloud taking him out of their sight (Acts 1:4-9).
In the apostles’ minds, this may harken back to the ascension of Elijah in 2 Kings 2. After the prophet’s dramatic exit in a whirlwind, accompanied by blazing horses and a chariot of fire, Elisha receives a double portion of Elijah’s spirit to carry on the prophetic ministry.
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