Friday, November 25, 2005

"I am coming soon!"

The angel said to me, "These words are trustworthy and true. The Lord, the God of the spirits of the prophets, sent his angel to show his servants the things that must soon take place."

"Behold, I am coming soon! Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy in this book."

I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I had heard and seen them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who had been showing them to me. But he said to me, "Do not do it! I am a fellow servant with you and with your brothers the prophets and of all who keep the words of this book. Worship God!"

Then he told me, "Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, because the time is near. Let him who does wrong continue to do wrong; let him who is vile continue to be vile; let him who does right continue to do right; and let him who is holy continue to be holy.

"Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End" (Revelation 22:6-13)

Today’s New Testament lesson comes from the last book of the Bible, the Revelation to Saint John. In this book, John was given a vision of the future by one of God’s angels. Chapter 22 is the end of the book. Here the angel of God tells John that everything he has seen and heard is true and should not be kept secret, but be published for all to read. But we are especially interested in the angel’s words when he quotes our Lord Jesus: "Behold, I am coming soon! Blessed is he who keeps the words of the prophecy in this book...Behold, I am coming soon! My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End."

When God sent his angel to give John this revelation, the church of Christ was going through some tough times. Some congregations had gotten lazy and stopped trying to win new converts to Christ. Some congregations had turned into cliques and were unwilling to admit new members. Some had allowed false doctrines to be taught in their midst, leading members away from Christ. And many congregations were cowering in fear of persecution, persecution from both Jews and Rome. Christians of this time lived in uncertainty. Do we belong to the right religion? How much worse can things get in this world? Has Christ forgotten about us? So John was given a divine revelation of the way things truly are, and the way things will be in the years ahead. John is told to publish this revelation so that everyone can benefit from it. But is this vision a comfort or a warning?

"Behold, I am coming soon!" What does this mean to a non-Christian? Probably not much. A non-Christian doesn’t believe that Jesus, if He ever existed at all, was anything more than a wise man like Confucius, Gotama Buddha or Muhammad. Such a person doesn’t believe that Jesus was the Son of God; indeed, the unbeliever may not believe that there even is a God. In any event, this Jesus is certainly not returning to this world, let alone as someone who has any kind of authority to sit in judgment over non-Christians. The unbeliever does not fear that anyone is going to hold him to account for the things he’s said and done in his life. What he has done with his life is no one’s business but his alone. To the unbeliever, "I am coming soon" is the empty promise of a religion based on empty hope.

The day of Jesus’ return is going to be a rude shock to the unbeliever. Jesus says, "I am the Alpha and the Omega, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." Alpha is the first letter in the Greek alphabet, the language that Revelation was originally written in; Omega is the last letter of that alphabet. In English, Jesus might have said, "I am the A and the Z, the First and the Last, the Beginning and the End." The Son of God is eternal, just like His Father—He has no beginning and He has no end. The Father created our world through the hands of His Son, as we read in the first chapter of John: "In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made." The Son will also be sent by His Father to judge the earth at the End, as we find written in Romans chapter 2 verse 16: "This will take place on the day when God will judge men's secrets through Jesus Christ." All of creation, everyone living in this world, is under the jurisdiction of Jesus Christ. And the writer to the Hebrews warns us: "It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God" (Hebrews 10:31).

Jesus is returning to act as judge. He said, "I will give to everyone according to what he has done." For the unbeliever, this is grim news indeed. If a person has lived his life without faith in Christ, he will have no hope of mercy. Life without faith in Jesus is life under the complete control of sin, and God will judge unrepentant sin as evil. Peter wrote, "the face of the Lord is against those who do evil" (1 Peter 3:12). Jesus Himself said, "whoever does not believe will be condemned" (Mark 16:16). Jesus promised that He will accept no excuses from those who rejected Him; "Make every effort to enter through the narrow door, because many, I tell you, will try to enter and will not be able to. Once the owner of the house gets up and closes the door, you will stand outside knocking and pleading, `Sir, open the door for us.' But he will answer, `I don't know you or where you come from.' Then you will say, `We ate and drank with you, and you taught in our streets.' But he will reply, `I don't know you or where you come from. Away from me, all you evildoers!'" (Luke 13:24-27). If a person has spent his life ignoring Jesus, Jesus will ignore his pleas for mercy on the Last Day.

When Jesus has completed His judging, sin will be brought to an end. Those who were judged guilty of living in unrepentant sin will be sent to hell, where they will pay an eternal price for their sin; "As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth" (Matthew 13:40-42). The earth itself, corrupted by mankind’s sinfulness, will be destroyed. Peter wrote, "The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare" (2 Peter 3:10). When Jesus returns in judgment, all sin will be ended forever. There will be no more evil deeds, no more lustful thoughts, no more betrayals of trust. There will be no more wars, no more hatred, no more lies. Every work of Satan and sinful men will be at an end.

There is a temptation for us to respond to God’s righteous wrath with smugness. How many people have hurt you and never gotten their just desserts? How many criminals have escaped justice in this life? There is a certain satisfaction in knowing that, in the end, every evildoer will get the punishment that he deserves. But as Christians, we shouldn’t feel this way. God created every soul of every sinner, with the intention of taking those souls to heaven as repentant, forgiven believers. Every person doomed by his own sinful pride to everlasting torment is a brother or a sister eternally lost to us. While we do heave a collective sigh of relief that Satan’s followers will never be able to hurt us again, we must regret that the light of faith that shines in our hearts will never have another opportunity to shine in theirs.

"Behold, I am coming soon!" What does this mean to a Christian? For a person who lives in faith, this is the most comforting of promises. For Christians, life is an unending struggle with the devil, the world, and our flesh. We are constantly assailed by doubts, like whether or not there really is an invisible, loving God who is in control of the universe. We are constantly hurt by the selfish words and deeds of people who listen to no authority but their own. We are constantly tempted to give up on living life by God’s standards and enjoying every sinful pleasure that comes our way. We cry out "Lord, how long?" and Jesus answers "I am coming soon."

Jesus is the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. Jesus is our Alpha and Omega. Jesus is our source of life and He is the source of our eternal rest. Jesus brought us life when He was born into a human body and lived the life of love that we failed to live. Jesus brought us life when He assumed the responsibility for all our sins and was punished for them by His Heavenly Father on the cross, a punishment ending with Jesus’ death for our crimes. Jesus brought us life when He returned to life from death, because He now stands at the right hand of the Father, as Paul writes: "Christ Jesus, who died--more than that, who was raised to life--is at the right hand of God and is also interceding for us" (Romans 8:34). Jesus brought us life by removing the guilt of our sins, and the death that was the penalty of that guilt. We have freedom from guilt and death; all we need do is confess that we have done wrong and Jesus forgives our sins, freeing us from the threat of judgment. Jesus is also our end. When Jesus gives us faith and we in turn dedicate our lives to Him--no matter how late in life--He promises us that we will have life beyond death. "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me will live, even though he dies; and whoever lives and believes in me will never die" (John 11:25-26). Jesus is the beginning and the end of every believer’s life.

Because we trust in our Savior’s love, we have no reason to fear His Second Coming. Jesus said, "My reward is with me, and I will give to everyone according to what he has done." What has the Christian done? What will we be rewarded for? Near the end of his life, Paul wrote, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. Now there is in store for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous Judge, will award to me on that day--and not only to me, but also to all who have longed for his appearing" (2 Timothy 4:7-8). Jesus will reward those who have kept the faith that He entrusted to them. Jesus said, "Whoever acknowledges me before men, I will also acknowledge him before my Father in heaven" (Matthew 10:32). Those who cling to the words of Jesus in the face of all the troubles that life brings will be rewarded with life everlasting.

Jesus comes to end our life-long battle with the forces of Darkness. Jesus fatally wounded Satan’s power when our Lord freed us from slavery to sin and death. It was only through sin that Satan could control us. It was only by death in sin that Satan could claim us as his own. Ever since Jesus rose on Easter morning, Satan has been fighting a desperate series of battles against the forces of Light, knowing that the final losing battle is drawing near. When Jesus returns in glory, Satan will be judged and confined to the torments of hell forever. When our Lord returns, all sin will be brought to an end. Paul tells us, "Behold, I show you a mystery; we shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible" (1 Corinthians 15:51-52). We will live again in our bodies, bodies free of the taint of sin, free of weakness and evil desires. Even the earth will be remade, free of disease and destructive weather and warring nations: in his revelation John wrote: "Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and there was no longer any sea [when used figuratively in the Bible, the 'sea' refers to the forces of chaos]. I saw the Holy City, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride beautifully dressed for her husband. And I heard a loud voice from the throne saying, "Now the dwelling of God is with men, and he will live with them. They will be his people, and God himself will be with them and be their God. He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away" (Revelation 21:1-4).

What a glorious vision! Try to imagine life without fear or anger or pain or loneliness. Try to imagine a life lived in God’s presence, where everything is beautiful and at peace. Try to imagine being loved by your Lord and being loved by everyone who lives on the new earth with you. No cross words. No days when you feel moody or depressed. Every day is perfect, and you will live each day knowing that the next one will be perfect too. Try to imagine how wonderful it will be.

"Behold, I am coming soon!" Yes, Lord, please come soon!

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