The Second Coming of Christ to the Earth

Transcript

GRM 1146
12/20/2015
The Second Coming of Christ to the Earth
Selected Verses
Gil Rugh

We're celebrating and enjoying the emphasis on the birth of Jesus Christ. And as in our previous study I want to continue our study today in talking about events associated with His Second Coming. It is exciting and awesome to consider that some 2000 years ago the Word became flesh, the God in whom and through whom all things were created had become a human being, a man born in humble circumstances, born to suffer and die, born to rule and reign. And those two facts were a cause of confusion among the people of Jesus' day and for some, continues to be confusing. Christ was born to rule and reign over all creation, establish a kingdom which would have no end. And He also said He came to give His life a ransom for many. And that was a cause of confusion. That was a cause of confusion for the prophets of the Old Testament who wrote about both of those events. The Apostle Peter wrote in his letter that the Old Testament prophets couldn't understand what they were writing, how that the promised Messiah, King of Israel could rule and reign in glory and also suffer and die in paying the penalty for sin. Now with the passing of time and the completion of God's revelation, we have a clearer perspective. There are two parts to the coming of Christ. The first, He would come to earth to suffer and die. The second, He would come to earth to rule and reign. And those events have been separated by some 2000 years, but because of His first coming we who have believed in Him have the hope and anticipation of the Second Coming to this earth to establish a kingdom of which we will be a part. And that's why the first coming was necessary. He came to this earth to deal with the issue of sin and by His death on the cross He paid the penalty for sin, paid it in full so that God could offer as a free gift His salvation—forgiveness of sins, being made new, being born into His family, being His child for time and eternity. For if Christ hadn't come and suffered and died, there would be no one to populate the kingdom that He would establish. There would be no hope for redemption. There would be no lifting of the curse from this earth. For all creation groans under the impact of man's sin. And it necessitated the death of Christ to provide the solution to sin and the possibility of the redemption of fallen humanity and the lifting of the curse from all creation so we could have a kingdom that could go on through eternity that would be everything God intended it to be when He first created it.

I want to talk about the Second Coming of Christ to earth, the establishing of the kingdom that He has promised. Now in our previous study, you have the chart on the 70 weeks—it just helps the perspective of God's plan and program. Why don't you come back to Daniel 9, a little bit of review but to tie things together. Daniel 9 is where we will look, in Daniel 9:24 this chart you have is based on Daniel 9. Verse 24 says, “Seventy weeks,” or literally 70 sevens “have been decreed for your people and your holy city.” So here God presents His plan. He gives the starting date, verse 25, “From the issuing of the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem until the Messiah the Prince there will be 7 weeks and 62 weeks.” So that's what you have in the first part of your chart, 69 weeks, they are weeks of years, that is 69 sevens for a total of 490 years with the 70 weeks., 483 of them until Messiah the Prince. So there is no question. It started with the decree to restore and rebuild Jerusalem which was given in 444 B.C., put the name on the chart there. Those 483 years would come to an end approximately one week before Christ was crucified, just rounded off for us for discussion, just about a week before the crucifixion of Christ. You see in verse 26 it says “then after the 62 weeks,” which are after the 7 weeks, remember. Seven weeks and 62 weeks for a total of 69 weeks “the Messiah will be cut off and have nothing.” No kingdom, He is not taking possession of the earth to rule and reign. And there is an indication here there is a break between the first 483 years and the last 7 years. You'll note when he says “after 62 weeks the Messiah will be cut off,” he doesn't say in the 70th week Messiah will be cut off because there is a break between the 69th and 70th week. God's program with Israel is put on hold, if I can put it that way, put on a sidetrack. Doesn't mean that God's purposes aren't being worked in Israel these days, but as far as His program in the world and the revelation of His work and the salvation and so on, Israel is on hold.

Then verse 27 says “and he will make a covenant,” and the “he” is the prince who is to come, not the Messiah. After the “Messiah is cut off and has nothing,” verse 26, “the people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary.” That was the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. And the prince who is to come will come out of those people. That was the nation Rome. We'll say more about that in a moment. Then this coming prince, a future one, not the Messiah but the opponent of the Messiah, if you will, the Antichrist, he “will make a firm covenant with the many for one week,” one 7-year period. In the middle of that 7-year period he'll “put a stop to sacrifice and grain offering.” And you'll note something has happened here. In the previous prophecy Jerusalem and the temple are going to be destroyed. Verse 26, “The people of the prince who is to come will destroy the city and the sanctuary,” but in verse 27 they are back in operation again because there is sacrifice and offering going on.

This is why for Old Testament prophets it was hard to understand. You see on the chart we have the church age in that tan color. That was not seen in Old Testament prophecy. So they saw the first coming of Christ with His suffering and death, then you jump to the 70th week, a time of trial and tribulation, and then the kingdom. That's why they couldn't put it together. There was no revelation about the church age as we title it. Sometimes it is put in parenthesis, not because it is a parenthesis in God's plan but it is a parenthesis in God's revelation. So you can see here we have an indication of a break after the 69th week. What will start the 70th week? This prince who is to come will sign an agreement with the nation Israel. In the middle of that 7-year period, that's why we divide that 7-year period into two 3½-year segments. There will be a change. And then at the end of the seven years the Messiah will come to earth again and establish His kingdom.

That gives you an overview of God's plan for the nation Israel. Back up to Daniel 2, may be review for most of you, but make sure we are all coming together on this. Daniel is interpreting a dream given to the Babylonian king, Nebuchadnezzar. And in that dream Nebuchadnezzar saw the image of a man and different parts of the image were different metals, starting with the head of gold. And so the interpretation is given beginning in verse 36 ff. And each part of this image of a man represent an empire, starting with the head. And it picks up with the empires from Daniel's day going forward, so you start with Babylon which was the empire ruling at that time. And then Babylon is followed, verse 39, by Medo-Persia. After Medo-Persia you have Greece, after Greece, verse 40, you have a fourth empire, Rome, noted for its strength. And then you are going to see in verse 41 there are feet and toes and there is a mixture of iron and clay. And we have an indication here again what Old Testament prophecy doesn't reveal—there is a break in time because the Roman Empire comes to an end as an empire. But it will have a revival when you get down to that last 7-year period. And so that is what is pictured here. You have the feet and toes and there are ten toes on an image, we'll see that specified in a moment. And verse 42, “The toes of the feet were partly iron and partly pottery, so the kingdom will be strong and brittle.” It's a strong empire, but it's a brittle empire. Note verse 44, those ten toes represent ten kings or kingdoms joined together in the revived Roman Empire. “In the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom which will never be destroyed. That kingdom will not be left for another people.” It is unique. After Babylon, Medo-Persia; after Medo-Persia, Greece; after Greece, Rome. That final form of the Roman Empire, this ten-kingdom confederacy comes the kingdom of Christ. No successive kingdoms, no follow-up kingdoms, the point. “It will endure forever.” And Daniel says “The great God,” the end of verse 45, “has made known to King Nebuchadnezzar what will take place in the future.”

So that's what you have. What is revealed here on this chart takes you from the crucifixion of the Messiah, being cut off, then you pick up with the 70th week. The church age is not there. I stress this because there is much confusion because people think these Old Testament prophecies, the kingdom that Christ established, began at the cross and it is a spiritual kingdom that exists in the heart of men. And what do you need to have a kingdom? You have to have a king and subjects. Well, Christ is King and we have subjected our hearts to Him through faith, therefore the kingdom is in existence. That's not the kind of kingdom he is talking about, he's talking about a kingdom that replaces earthly kingdoms, that rules in the place of earthly kingdoms.

Back up a little bit to Isaiah 2. Just some of the passages, and I've just picked these three from Isaiah. We'll stay here so we are not spending a lot of time moving through a variety of places. That prophesy a coming earthly kingdom over which the Messiah will rule, this was expected by the Jews. Remember when the kings from the orient, as we title them, came to worship Christ. Where is He who has been born King of the Jews? We came to worship a king. He is born to be a King. Same as the announcement by the angels to the shepherds, said that the King has been born. Isaiah prophesied that, look at Isaiah 2. “And this is the word concerning Judah and Jerusalem,” verse 1. The kingdom particularly refers to the Jews, although we as the church will be part of it. We are all, every believer is going toward the kingdom. But note what he says about this kingdom in verse 2. “It will come about in the last days,” we move toward the end of time, “the mountain of the house of the Lord will be established as the chief of the mountains.” And in prophecy a mountain is a symbol of a kingdom and that was true in Daniel 2. If we had read all the verses, that the kingdom that the Messiah would establish would grow into a great mountain. So the mountain of the kingdom of Christ, of the Lord will be chief over all the kingdoms. There will be other kingdoms, other nations when Christ rules. But He will rule over all.

“Many people will come and say come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob.” The capital will be at Mt. Zion, Jerusalem. “He can teach us His ways, the Law will go forth from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem. He will judge between the nations, render decisions for many people. They will hammer their swords into plowshares, their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not lift up sword against nation, never again will they learn war.” A verse that I believe is inscribed on the United Nations' building. It has nothing to do with this period of time. Just try it. Nations that have no armaments, no defense, they live under the authority of other nations. But when Christ rules there will be no armies, there will be no weapons, there will be no wars. He will sovereignly rule over all.

Obviously we are not there. Have you read the paper? Seen the news? There are people who say we are in the kingdom. I hope not, if this is what we've been looking for, it's a disappointment. I mean, people afraid to go to the mall for fear they'll get shot. Battles raging. It won't be that way when Christ rules, but He'll rule on this earth. You'll note he is talking about an earthly kingdom. What happens among nations? Wars, armaments.

Come over to Isaiah 9, and again in chapter 9, we won't take the time, but in the first part of the chapter you have prophecy regarding the first coming of Christ. And Christ applied it to Himself during His earthly ministry. But the last part here that we're going to pick up, not the last part of the chapter but further on, he moves to the Second Coming of Christ and what will be true when His Second Coming . . . Because these were the days of the Messiah, and for Old Testament revelation they are talked about together. It won't be until the New Testament that we'll understand there is going to be a spread, the church age. So you read Isaiah 9:6, “For a child will be born to us, a Son will be given to us, the government will rest on His shoulders.” He will rule. “His name will be called wonderful counselor, mighty God, eternal Father, prince of peace. There will be no end to the increase of His government or of peace.” You see, no subsequent kingdoms, His is an eternal kingdom. “On the throne of David and over His kingdom.” This was the promise God gave to David and His descendants in 2 Samuel 7 which we call the Davidic Covenant. The Messiah, the descendant of David will rule forever. “To establish it, uphold it with justice and righteousness from then on and forevermore.” And this won't be accomplished by human efforts, “the zeal of the Lord of hosts will accomplish this.”

One other passage in Isaiah, chapter 11. Characteristic of this kingdom, and again you have the first coming of Christ and the Second Coming of Christ. The chapter opens up, “A shoot will spring from the stem of Jesse, a branch from his root,” He is the descendant of David to bring about the fulfillment of the Davidic Covenant, that David's son, descendant, would rule, the Spirit upon Him. But then we come to verse 4, “With righteousness He will judge the poor, decide with fairness for the afflicted of the earth, will strike the earth with the rod of His mouth, with the breath of His lips will slay the wicked. Righteousness will be . . .” Well, that's not going on today. Some people spiritualize this and say well, spiritually it is going on as the truth is presented and so on. No, look at verse 6, “The wolf will dwell with the lamb, the leopard will lie down with the young goat, the calf and the young lion and the fatling together. A little boy will lead them.” You see the curse is lifted from the creation, it impacts everything. So when Christ reigns the animals won't be warring with one another. You can go swim in alligator-infested waters, you can keep cobras as pets. I'm not but you can. But there will be no violence. You see the curse is removed. That's why Romans 8 says the whole creation groans in anticipation of the time when Christ will reign, because the effects of man's sin have corrupted all the creation.

“They will not hurt or destroy in all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters cover the sea.” So that's why there won't be any armaments, there won't be any wars, there won't be any violence. The King rules. Now for the first thousand years of this eternal kingdom He rules with a rod of iron and there will be certain things that take place. Judgment will take place. If anyone dies only reaching a hundred years of age, they will be though an infant. It will be clear it was the judgment of God. There will not be any violence tolerated in this kingdom among the subjects, not any crime. You won't have to be afraid to go out at night and so on. Christ rules sovereignly for the first thousand years, He is finally dealing with sin. But that's the first phase of the eternal kingdom.

This is where we are going, this is what is anticipated when He is born. That's why it's announced that He's the king, He's the Messiah, He has been born to rule. Even as He faces His crucifixion, Pilate asks Him, are you the King of the Jews? I was born to be King. He was, but there is something wrong here, isn't there? Christ says My kingdom won't come out of this world, in other words it won't be established by the means that the Romans established their kingdom, by fighting and warring and becoming the strongest. Christ will establish His kingdom by descending from heaven in power and glory.

Come over to Matthew 24. You'll see the order. Now keep in mind that tan period called the church age does not appear in Old Testament. It is basically absent, except for some references, in the Gospels. It is material that will be revealed after the resurrection and ascension of Christ. So in Matthew 24 Christ tells them that the temple that they see and are so in awe of is going to be destroyed. The disciples are pointing out the magnificence of what we call Herod's temple, and it was a building of marble. But Jesus said to them, verse 2, “Do you not see all these things? I tell you not one stone will be left upon another.” A number of you have visited Jerusalem and you can see the huge stones that were used in building that temple lying there piled upon one another as they were cast down. Then they say, “Tell us, when will these things happen? What will be the sign of your coming and the end of the age?” They are looking toward the end of the age which will culminate with the Messiah establishing His kingdom. We are on this track. If this is going to be destroyed, when are you going to establish your kingdom?

So He tells them, “Don't be misled, many will come in My name. You will hear wars and rumors of war.” Verse 9, “They will deliver you up to tribulation, kill you, you will be hated.” Here is an indication, we're going to have some time go by here; the kingdom is not on the near horizon. He's talking to them about what is going to take place in the 70th week, that seven years that will culminate in the kingdom. Because they are asking Him, what will be the sign of your coming when you will establish the kingdom? Well, He reviews what Old Testament prophecy revealed. We didn't look, but Old Testament prophets talked about this period of time, the day of the Lord, coming tribulation. And it's going to be a difficult time.

Then he stopped. From verse 5 down through verse 14 you get an overview of the seven years. You'll note in verse 9, it says “Then they will deliver you to tribulation.” That marks what is going to happen in the middle of that 70th week, 3½ years in. Now he goes back and picks that up because that is what is most important to the Jews because that is what will culminate in His coming, that second half of that 70th week.

“Therefore when you see the abomination of desolation which was spoken of through Daniel the prophet standing in the holy place.” Another indication, do you know what is going to happen? The temple is going to be rebuilt. Now Jesus said back in verse 2 there wouldn't be a stone left upon another in the temple. Now He says when you get to the middle of that 70th week, the temple will be rebuilt. So it was destroyed by the Romans in 70 A.D. There have been re-buildings but nothing to amount to anything. What do they need today? The problem is you have a mosque on the temple site. What are we going to do about that? I don't know but it's going because the temple will be rebuilt.

At any rate when you see the abomination of desolation, Daniel 9 talks about there comes on the wing of abomination one who makes desolate, Daniel 9 in connection with the 70 weeks. Jesus says when you see that abomination spoken of by Daniel the prophet standing in the holy place, you better leave Jerusalem on the run. Don't even stop to pack an overnight bag. Why? Verse 21, “Then there will be a great tribulation such as has not occurred since the beginning of the world until now nor ever will be.” In fact it is going to be so bad, unless those days are being cut short no life would have been saved.

Now think about it, the book of Revelation unfolds this 7-year period in chapters 6-19. There are a series of three sets of seven judgments—seven seals, seven trumpets, seven bowls. Seven seals on a scroll, every time a seal is broken that is sealed to that point, a judgment comes out. Out of the seventh seal come seven trumpets. Every time a trumpet is sounded a judgment comes pouring out on the earth. When the seventh trumpet is sounded, out comes seven bowls. Every time a bowl is turned over, judgment is poured out on the earth. Now think about this. In just one of the seven seals and one of the seven trumpets, one-half of the earth's population dies. Now we are in the billions. That is just two, there are seven seals. Under one of them one-quarter of the earth's population dies. There are seven trumpets, under just one of them one-quarter of the earth's population dies. We are at half of the earth's population dead under those two. And the worst are yet to come because the seven bowls are the worst of all the judgments. Any wonder Jesus said unless those days would be cut short, no one would survive. But He is coming to rescue His people, the elect.

And don't be taken up with people who say Christ has come. During that time they will begin to look for deliverance. Why? Down in verse 27, “For just as the lightning comes from the east and flashes to the west, so will the coming of the Son of Man be.” Verse 29, “Immediately after the tribulation of those days,” and that 7-year period and particularly the last 3½ years, “the sun will be darkened, the moon will not give its light, the stars will fall from the sky, the power of heaven will be shaken. The sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky. All the tribes of the earth will mourn, they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory.” The Second Coming of Christ to earth will not be anything like His first coming, born in a little town of Bethlehem, a few travelers from the east come to worship Him. Before that some shepherds from the fields. He grows up as a carpenter, dies on a cross. Next time He comes to this earth it will be a display of glory that overwhelms the earth. No one will not know He is here, the whole world will see Him coming. How can they do that? Maybe now that we have television . . . Won't need it, God can display Him to the whole world, and He comes to establish His kingdom.

Come over to Revelation, then we have to fill in this gap and tie it together. In the book of Revelation the church is mentioned by name, the church, the ekklesia 20 times, 19 times in the first three chapters and once in the chapter 20. Do you know what happens? When you leave chapter 3 you go to the heavenly scene, you see the church in heaven there under the picture of the 24 elders. Then you have chapters 6-19 and do you know what? The church is not there because Revelation 6-19, you can mark it on your chart, the 70th week, those seven years. That is what is covered in Revelation 6-19. It moves you chronologically through that seven-year period. It culminates in Revelation 19, so come to Revelation 19. And there is celebration in heaven because Revelation 19:11, “I saw heaven opened and behold a white horse and he who sat on it is called Faithful and True. In righteousness He judges and wages war.” Down in verse 14, “The armies which are in heaven clothed in fine linen white and clean were following Him.” And He comes down and destroys that little horn, the prince who is to come, the lawless one, the Antichrist. They are cast into the lake of fire. And you come to chapter 20 and you have a kingdom established for a thousand years.

So the flow is consistent. And Christ will reign. And the first part of this kingdom is a thousand years, we'll pick it up while we are here. Six times in verses 2-7 he calls it a thousand years. Satan is bound. Now put up the other chart, this is a chart of the resurrections but you'll see what happens here. We are going to have two stages in the return of Christ. When Christ returns to earth before the thousand years, Satan is bound so he will not be operative. Now we are what you call pre-millennialists, we believe Christ will come before the thousand-year kingdom, the millennium, a thousand years. We get that from the Latin for a thousand. He comes pre-millennial kingdom. The post-millennials believe He will come after the thousand years, the earth is going to get better and better and the Gospel will soon overwhelm the earth and the world as a whole will be converted and we'll have the kingdom. And then Christ will come. People still believe that. We are pre-millennialists. So right there, this is why. Christ comes after the seven years to establish a kingdom which will be a thousand years. Satan is bound for a thousand years. There are those who are a-millennialists, the “a” in front of millennium means no millennium. So they don't believe in the literal earthly thousand years. They sometimes call themselves, we are in a realized kingdom, we are in it today. They believe the kingdom began with the first coming of Christ at the cross and the Gospel is defeating the enemies and it spiritually exists in the hearts of men. And there is no future earthly kingdom as such. Roman Catholicism is a-millennial, much of reformed theology is a-millennial. There is a variation in reformed theology but much of it is a-millennial. They don't believe, the kingdom exists now, it is a spiritual kingdom.

So they say in verse 2, “They laid hold of the dragon, the serpent of old who is the devil and bound him for a thousand years.” They say Satan is bound today, he has no authority over God's people and he is being defeated. But he is bound, verse 3, “so he would not deceive the nations any longer until the thousand years were completed.” I was reading a man this week, he is writing on the Puritan hope, about the Puritans because the Puritans were not dispensational. And for the most part they were not pre-millennial. And his view of Revelation 20, he says Revelation 20 is a very murky, unclear passage so we don't want to build anything on that. Well it is murky and unclear to him because he won't accept it for what it says. A thousand years doesn't mean a thousand years, and Satan being bound, well he's not bound so he doesn't influence Christians, he is bound so that he can't deceive the nations. Anybody think the nations are not being deceived today by the devil? I mean, he is the god of this world.

But for a thousand years Christ reigns, this is that rule with a rod of iron. There is peace over the whole earth. But do you know what is happening? There are people who have been born into this kingdom. When Christ returns, He will judge all unbelievers, those who have not become believers in that seven-year period will be cast into hell. So at the beginning of the thousand years there are only believers. During that thousand years there is no pain, there is no suffering, there is no disease, there is no death except for judgment by Christ. So you are going to have a population explosion because the people who have believed go into that thousand years in their physical body and they have children. But do you know what? Those children are born with a sin nature, they will have to, as they get older, place their faith in Christ who is bodily ruling in Jerusalem. So at the end of a thousand years Satan is released, Revelation 20:7, and “will come out to deceive the nations which are in the four corners of the earth, gather them together for the war. The number of them is like the sand of the seashore.” Do you know what? Do you know what the thousand years reveals? The problem that mankind has is not the devil, the problem mankind has is with their own sinful heart. Jeremiah the prophet wrote “the heart is deceitful and desperately wicked above all things.” After living their entire life, being born and lived their whole life, and they won't die, anyone who dies at only 100 years of age will be thought accursed by God because they will die under the judgment of God. When given a choice between two kings, Christ and the devil, a number like the sand of the seashore say, “we choose the devil, let's dethrone Christ and establish our own king.”

Then you have the final judgment, you have the destruction, then you have the Great White Throne, the final sentencing to hell of all unbelievers from all time. And then Revelation 21 opens up, “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth” and all sin and all sinners are excluded from this realm of the kingdom. After the thousand years the kingdom goes on but there are no unredeemed sinners, no remnants of sin in this at all. So you see the holy city, the New Jerusalem. You come down into Revelation 22 and you have a description here. And you understand the kingdom goes on.

All right, now we have to put the first stage. Not revealed in the Old Testament as you can expect was the church from the cross to that first stage, we call it, the rapture. Come to 1 Thessalonians 4. I believe the Bible teaches that just as the church did not begin until after the 69th week of Daniel, then there is a break, it will be removed from the earth before the 70th week begins so that God can complete His program with Israel.

1 Thessalonians 4:13, “We do not want you to be uninformed, brethren, about those who are asleep so you won't grieve as the rest who have no hope. For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so God will bring with Him those who have fallen asleep in Jesus.“ So any believer who dies today goes immediately into the presence of the Lord. To be absent from the body is to be present with the Lord. The Lord will bring those with Him. “For this I say to you by the word of the Lord, that we who are alive and remain until the coming of the Lord will not precede,” go before, “those who have fallen asleep. For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with a voice of the archangel and the trumpet of God. Then the dead will rise first, then we who are alive and remain will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And so shall we ever be with the Lord.” You see what happens there. Those who have died, their bodies come out of the grave. They as a person come back, they've been with God in glory. The body without the spirit is dead. They move back into their bodies that are now glorified, like the body Christ had after His resurrection. Immediately following that we who are alive will experience an instantaneous transformation, 1 Corinthians 15 says in an atom of time, quicker than your eyes blink we will be transformed. We meet in the air and we go to be with the Lord. A picture as we've talked about, of the oriental wedding where the commitment has been made, the betrothal, then at a future time the bridegroom comes to get his bride and take her to his father's house, the place where he has prepared a place for them. That's the picture here and it continues on then, down into chapter 5.

You don't need me to tell you about the different times, because they have the Old Testament. “You yourselves know full well the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night.” Now we are in the 7-year period after the rapture. So the order flows. “And when they are saying peace and safety destruction will come upon them. But,” verse 4, “you, brethren, are not in darkness that that day would overtake you like a thief.” Verse 9, “God has not destined us for wrath.” He's talking about that period of time of judgment on the earth when the wrath of God is poured out, like Revelation 6-19 talks about the earth dwellers, this is where they belong. This is where they are connected. We are not appointed to wrath. Verse 10, “He died for us, so whether we are awake or asleep, we live together with Him.” So you see you put together the end of chapter 4 with chapter 5, and remember there were no chapters or verses when this was written, it's just the flow. Christ will come and get us to take us to be with Himself, we'll meet Him in the air. That's not when He comes to the earth in glory and power, it's when He comes to get His bride to take her to the Father's house.

Come back to Revelation 19, we're going to run out of time but that's all right. If the Lord comes this week, we'll get the final chapter. Revelation 19:7, just before heaven opens in verse 11, “Let us rejoice and give glory to Him, the marriage of the Lamb has come,” has occurred. “His bride has made herself ready. It was given to her to clothe herself in fine linen white and clean, the fine linen is the righteousnesses of the saints. Blessed are those who are invited to the marriage supper of the Lamb.” Down in verse 14, when heaven is opened and the armies which are in heaven “clothed in fine linen white and clean were following Him on white horses.” I'll be walking along but I'll be there. But we come with Him. You see the connection. Verse 8, the bride is clothed in fine linen bright and clean; verse 14, the armies which are behind Him clothed in fine linen white and clean. We have been caught up to meet Him in the air, now as His bride we are back for the celebration when we will be unveiled before all creation as the bride of Christ, the establishing of the kingdom.

So we are looking forward. This is called dispensationalism. We are pre-millennial, we believe Christ will come before the millennium, we are also pre-tribulational, we believe Christ will come before the 7-year tribulation for the church. There are two parts in the Second Coming of Christ. This is not surprising; it wasn't revealed in the Old Testament because the church wasn't revealed in the Old Testament. So, just as it was not revealed in the Old Testament that there would be an extensive period of time between the coming of Christ to suffer and die and the coming of Christ to rule and reign, so it was not until the New Testament that there was revelation given regarding the rapture of the church.

One other passage, Ephesians 3, and we do have studies where we have done details of these facts over time that you can secure online or download at Sound Words. Ephesians 3, Paul tells us none of this was revealed before. Verse 2, “If you have heard of the stewardship of God's grace which was given to me,” and that was to be an apostle to the Gentiles. Verse 3, “That by revelation there was made known to me the mystery as I wrote before in brief. By referring to this when you read you can understand my insight into the mystery of Christ.” What is a mystery? Look at verse 5, “Which in other generations was not made known to the sons of men.” A mystery in the Bible is not something puzzling and confusing and hard to understand, a mystery in the Bible is something God had not revealed before. It is not something hard to understand, it is something impossible to understand without the revelation of God.

“Now it has been revealed to His apostles and prophets in the Spirit that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, fellow members of the body, fellow partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the Gospel.” That's new. The Old Testament revealed that Gentiles could be saved, they would convert to Judaism. There will be Gentiles in the kingdom, the Old Testament talked about that. But the fact that God would have a whole segment of time where he stops dealing with Israel as His focal point in His work in the world and deals with the nations, that was not in the Old Testament. That the Gentiles would come in enmasse like they do in the church. Look at us, look around, there maybe are a few people of Jewish background, but by and large the church is Gentile. There will come a time when that 7-year period serves two purposes—it is pouring out God's wrath on an unbelieving world and it is preparing the nation Israel to finally turn from their sin and place their faith in Christ as their Savior and Messiah so that the kingdom can be established.

So I am not pessimistic. I was reading a book I referred to. He has a problem with pre-millennialists and dispensationalists, they are pessimistic. They think it is going to get worse and we are moving toward the worst time. It's not my fault, it's what God says. It's like saying don't tell people about hell, that's pessimistic. It's reality. If you don't place your faith in Christ, you are destined to hell. You know when you get down to the end of that thousand years, there are only two places to be—in the eternal kingdom or in the eternal hell. There are no other options. I am an optimist. It is going to decline and get worse, but I'm looking for the return of Christ and the ultimate victory. And that's why we are here, redeemed people telling others there is a Savior, judgment is coming. But Christ came the first time to spare you from coming judgment, to bring you His salvation so you can be part of the glories that He has prepared for all creation. And you can share in it as His child. Think about that. When heaven is opened, Christ descends and the whole earth sees Him, you and I as members of His bride, the church, are going to be right there behind Him. Think of that scene, coming down from heaven, all that glory.

People think you are pessimistic, I'm an optimist. I don't have a lot of hope for the future of the world in the hands of man under the control of the devil, but I have complete confidence, I've read the last chapter, I see how it ends. Everything fits. What a privilege to know that Christ came to be our Savior.

Let's pray together. Thank You, Lord, for the riches of Your Word. Thank You for the power of Your salvation. Lord, thank You for Your graciousness in unfolding for us the beauty of Your plan of redemption for fallen man, for corrupted creation. We have the hope of looking forward to the time Christ will come and call us to meet Him in the air. We look forward ultimately to the time when we will return with Him in glory to rule and reign with Him for all eternity. May we live each day with that as our perspective, may we be diligent about Your work, sharing the message of life while we have opportunity. We pray in Christ's name, amen.