When Will Christ Return?
1 Thessalonians • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 10 viewsDoes the Bible give us any clues as to when the second coming will take place? These verses will help us to understand that God has destined His people for salvation and we are to encourage each other as the day of His coming draws near.
Notes
Transcript
If you have a Bible, go ahead and grab it. We’re going to be in 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11 tonight and it is quite the section of Scripture that we will be seeing tonight. Tonight we are going to talk about the signs of Christ’s second coming and we are going to see if the Bible gives us any hint as to when Christ might return. Ever since Christ first ascended into Heaven, there have been people that have been trying to pinpoint when He was going to return. There have been people who have literally made an entire career with making “educated” guesses as to when Christ would return. You had people that Jesus would return by the year 100 ad and the year 1000 ad. You had people during the time of the Reformation who believed that the return of Christ was eminent. Even Jonathan Edwards during the period of the Great Awakening looked at what was happening during the Great Awakening and thought that Christ was coming really soon. You had people in the 80’s who thought Christ would return by the end of the 80’s and people in the 90’s who thought that Christ would return in the year 2000 and even now we see people make baseless claims as to when He might return in the near or far future. What we’ve seen from 2,000 years of study is really one conclusion: No one knows the time or the hour of Christ’s return. Should we be surprised by this? Not at all because Jesus says in Matthew 24:36
Matthew 24:36 (ESV)
“But concerning that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but the Father only.
What does this mean about our question that we will be focusing on tonight? Is it possible to know with certainty when Christ will return? Because it sounds like we won’t be able to know and I think we see an example of a mountain range question and answer. If we were to go out west to the Rocky Mountains we could stand from a distance and see the evidence that there was a mountain range there. We could see from a distance all the peaks but we would not be able to know each mountain in detail until we came immediately upon it and stood at the peaks of each individual mountain. In the same way we can apply this to Christ’s second coming. What we are going to see tonight and in a few weeks in 2 Thessalonians is that we even now can see signs that Christ’s return could come at any moment but we won’t truly know until the hour comes and we know that the hour is coming so we must always be ready. What we are going to see tonight is that Paul wants us to be prepared because Christ could return at any moment and there will be signs I think that Christ will come soon. I also think that we have seen these signs over the past 2000 years because in the grand scheme of eternity, Christ’s return is very soon and it has been very soon over the last 2000 years. Peter reminds us that for the Lord a thousand years is like a day. If the Lord sees 1000 years as a single day, the return of Christ will be very soon on Heaven’s calendar. So, how can we be ready? What should we be looking for? That’s what we will talk about tonight and while we certainly can’t cover everything, we will try to cover as much as we can. Let’s pray and then we will read 1 Thessalonians 5:1-11
Now concerning the times and the seasons, brothers, you have no need to have anything written to you. For you yourselves are fully aware that the day of the Lord will come like a thief in the night. While people are saying, “There is peace and security,” then sudden destruction will come upon them as labor pains come upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. But you are not in darkness, brothers, for that day to surprise you like a thief. For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation. For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.
The Signs of Christ’s Return (Verses 1-4)
The Signs of Christ’s Return (Verses 1-4)
What does Paul say about possible sign’s that Christ’s return is imminent? In the first 4 verses, we see a few things that Paul wants the Thessalonians to be aware of. In verse 1, Paul continues to encourage the Thessalonians by using a phrase that he has already used in this letter and he says concerning the times and the seasons, you have no need to have anything written to you. He’s just writing what has already been told to them in person. I want to throw this out to you because I think this is important for you to know. When we talk about the times and seasons of the second coming, Paul is addressing dates and events. What the Thessalonians were thinking about was the same thing that you and I have likely thought about. They wanted to know time, location, and events that would show that this was all coming together but Paul says, “In regards to those things, you don’t need to know that.” Why wouldn’t they need to know that? Well look at it this way, if you knew the exact time and the exact day that Christ would return, would it cause you to do anything differently? If you knew He wouldn’t return for another 2,000 years, would you still feel the same sense of urgency as if He was coming tomorrow? Would you still feel the pressure to reach others with the Gospel before the appointed time if it felt like He wasn’t coming this very day? If you knew He was coming within a year, wouldn’t that push you to maybe panic just a little bit and try to finish that bucket list before He arrived? I think these are things we would all do. It’s not for us to know the time or the hour because even if we did know, we would probably not live for God in the same way. God is very strategic in not revealing every little detail to us because He knows that what is best for us is to not know the time or place of Christ’s coming! Yet this does not stop Paul or the Lord from giving us signs that Christ could return at any moment. Paul uses 2 metaphors in verses 2-4 to relate the suddenness and unpredictability of Christ’s return. He uses the example of a thief in the night and this is something that Christ Himself references in regards to His return and he also uses the example of labor pains, of a woman who is about to give birth. John Stott writes, “Putting these 2 metaphors together, we may say that Christ’s coming will be sudden and unexpected (like a burglar in the night), and sudden and unavoidable (like labor at the end of pregnancy). In the first case there will be no warning, and in the second, no escape.” I don’t know if you have ever had someone break into your house before but it can be a jarring event. It really shakes you because you are in the place that you feel the safest and suddenly that sense of security is gone and it happens when you least expect it. You don’t get a letter in the mail from the person about to rob you with the date and time that they are going to be there. You also don’t stay up every night for the rest of your life with the expectancy that someone is going to rob you. Instead you go about your life and you hope and pray for the best. What Paul says here and what Jesus said at the end of Matthew 24 is that the Lord is going to come so quickly and suddenly that we really just need to try and be prepared for the reality of it happening. You just need to be aware that it’s going to happen and it may even happen when you least expect it. Paul says in verse 3 that people will say that there is peace and security and then sudden destruction happens. Not only will it be sudden, it will be intense. It is going to be something that the world cannot escape from just like a woman in labor can’t escape from her labor pains until the baby is born. What’s amazing about labor is that while you have 9 months of “signs” you really don’t know when labor is going to happen until it starts. Lora and I know this very well from Eden birth. All I know is that the morning before she was born, there were hardly any signs that she was going to be born early the next morning. Then suddenly between 9 and midnight, labor just went into overdrive and next thing we knew, we had a baby girl. Once labor started, there’s no avoiding it. Right now we are in the 9 months leading up to labor and while we may not know the very day or second that the Lord will come, we know that He is coming soon. Take a look at the world around you and tell me, do you see signs that the Lord is coming soon? I really wish we had the time to go through Matthew 24, Daniel 9, and the book of Revelation but what is seen in those chapters is the firm reminder that this world is in God’s hands and the time will come exactly when He decides. The world does not dictate the end times. Nathan had mentioned before about the doomsday clock and how it says that we are “90 seconds to midnight” and this is supposed to scare us about how the world could end 90 seconds from now. Why should I be afraid about 90 seconds when Jesus could return in half a second? If God so willed it, He could return now and He has every right to. The Bible tells us that at the end there will be war, there will be natural disasters, there will be false teachings and people turning on one another, there will be a hatred of God and His Church, and this has been how the world has been since Christ rose from the dead! These signs have always been occuring so we know that we are always in the last days. Will there be an increase in these things towards the end? I think Scripture makes it clear that we will see an increase so what should we do? We know these things are going on even now and we know that while we may not know the day or the hour, we know the certainty of the event. We know that Christ is coming soon, the signs are all there, how should we live and what should we do in the meantime? I think Paul gives us part of the answer in 1 Thessalonians 5:5-8
For you are all children of light, children of the day. We are not of the night or of the darkness. So then let us not sleep, as others do, but let us keep awake and be sober. For those who sleep, sleep at night, and those who get drunk, are drunk at night. But since we belong to the day, let us be sober, having put on the breastplate of faith and love, and for a helmet the hope of salvation.
What Should We Do? (Verses 5-8)
What Should We Do? (Verses 5-8)
What is Paul saying here to the Thessalonians and to us? He is saying that the Day of the Lord is coming and our lives should reflect that reality. It may be easier to say how we shouldn’t live. We should not be of the mindset that we can coast until eternity comes. I think we need to take Isaiah 22 into consideration, specifically verses 12-13. Isaiah 22:12-13 says
Isaiah 22:12–13 (ESV)
In that day the Lord God of hosts
called for weeping and mourning,
for baldness and wearing sackcloth;
and behold, joy and gladness,
killing oxen and slaughtering sheep,
eating flesh and drinking wine.
“Let us eat and drink,
for tomorrow we die.”
God is giving this great warning to Jerusalem, He has revealed that judgment and wrath is due to them and instead of living lives of repentance and mourning, they turn to joy and gladness. They say, if we’re gonna die tomorrow, we might as well eat, drink, and be merry today. That’s not the mindset that we should have as the people of God. That may be the mindset of the wicked and unbelievers but that can’t be our mindset. We are to be a ready people. We are to be like soldiers waiting at the front line waiting for our commanding officer to yell charge. We wait and we watch with expectant hearts. Paul emphasizes that we are children of light and as we belong to the Lord and His day. We are to live lives full of faith and love and have unwavering hope in God’s promises and that just as He saved us in eternity past, is saving us in eternity present, and will see that we remained saved for eternity future. I think that as long as we cling to the breastplate of faith and love and the helmet of the hope of salvation that our lives will look drastically different than the world. We need to return to God’s Word and we need to look at what He says in regards to the world’s end and not what the world says. I think we see a picture of this in the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70. It was said that prior to Jerusalem’s destruction, Christians fled to a town called Pella because they knew the signs of Jerusalem’s destruction? How did they know? They saw the Roman army advancing but they knew it was about to happen because they knew what Christ said in His Word! He warned His followers in Matthew 24 that the day would come when they would see armies advancing on every side and that they should flee to the mountains and sure enough this is what happened. Tradition says that it was largely Christians that escaped the destruction of Jerusalem because Christ told them ahead of time what to look out for. Christ now tells us what we should look out for! We know that there will be signs of His coming and this should directly impact everything that we do. We are to live in light of eternity. So, what should we do between now and then? We live as children of light. We live as people that do not fall asleep as others do but live lives with the joyful expectation that our King is coming to set the captives free. Does your life reflect the knowledge that the Lord is coming soon and He is not coming as a baby again. He is not coming as the suffering servant. He is not coming as the lamb to be slain. He is coming as the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. He is coming as the roaring Lion of the tribe of Judah. John writes in Revelation 19:11-16
Then I saw heaven opened, and behold, a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness he judges and makes war. His eyes are like a flame of fire, and on his head are many diadems, and he has a name written that no one knows but himself. He is clothed in a robe dipped in blood, and the name by which he is called is The Word of God. And the armies of heaven, arrayed in fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh he has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords.
Jesus is coming with a sword, He is coming to right every wrong and notice that His robe is already dipped in blood. The battle of Armageddon is not going to be some long drawn out affair. Christ is clothed in a robe dipped in blood and this is a reminder that He has already secured the victory. This isn’t His blood, this isn’t the blood of His sacrifice, this is the blood of His enemies! Our Lord will return and victory will be sure and sudden! Christ will pour out the wrath of God over all that are ungodly and His rule will be permanent and He will reign supreme and we will reign with Him as those that have been purchased by His blood. Thomas Schreiner writes, “Sometimes it seems as if evil will triumph forever, but such an impression does not accord with reality. Jesus is coming again, and the rulers and people opposed to him will be destroyed. Evil is no illusion, but goodness is always stronger and has an enduring permanence that evil cannot match. God has allowed evil to do its worst for many millennia, but he will not tolerate it forever. When Jesus returns, we will see the last battle. But the battle is remarkably easy, for Jesus simply speaks the word and his enemies are routed and thrown into the lake of fire.”
How Can We Be Encouraged? (Verses 9-11)
How Can We Be Encouraged? (Verses 9-11)
With the few minutes we have left, let’s look at verses 9-11. How can we be encouraged before the day of the Lord comes. Paul writes in 1 Thessalonians 5:9-11
For God has not destined us for wrath, but to obtain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us so that whether we are awake or asleep we might live with him. Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing.
These are some of my favorite verses in the Bible. I have looked at these verses for the exact purpose of what Paul says in verse 11: to encourage me and build myself up. As the day draws near, we as Christians need to remember that God has not destined us for wrath but to obtain salvation through Christ so that whether we live or whether we die, we might live with Him. As Christians, there is nothing that comes into our lives that is not meant for our good. There is nothing that comes into our lives that God is not sovereign over. Whether we live or whether we die, and last I checked, those are the only 2 options for us, whether we live or whether we die, we belong to the Lord. Whether we are awake or asleep, we belong to Him. God has not destined us for wrath but to obtain salvation. No matter what comes into my life, I know that I belong to the Lord. If cancer comes, it is not wrath. If I lose everything, it is not wrath. If my life is taken from me, it is not wrath. How do I know this? Because on the cross as Jesus died, the wrath of God was what? It was satisfied. God’s wrath was totally and completely satisfied because Christ’s sacrifice was more than sufficient. He absorbed the wrath of God on my behalf and because Christ drank the cup to the very last wrath I can know with certainty that anything that God brings into my life is not wrath! It is love! It is joy! It is God-ordained for my good. Even death? Even death! Because all death will do is bring me before the One that saved me and that is good! I don’t believe that this verse means that we will get to avoid the tribulation. We will go through tribulation with the mindset that God’s wrath is being poured on the world and not on us. We won’t be taken out of the world but we will ultimately be kept by Christ from falling away and enduring judgment. As we go about our lives, we go about encouraging and building each other up. Christians always need to be reminded of the reality that God is for them and not against them. C.S. Lewis was asked about the reality of living in a world where atomic bombs could be dropped at any moment and he said that he didn’t want to live his life in a constant state of fear. Lewis said, “The first action to be taken is to pull ourselves together. If we are going to be destroyed by an atomic bomb, let that bomb, when it comes, find us doing sensible and human things -- praying, working, teaching, reading, listening to music, bathing the children, playing tennis, chatting to our friends over a pint and a game of darts -- not huddled together like frightened sheep and thinking about bombs.” Couldn’t we apply this to the second coming? Couldn’t we apply this to trials and tribulation? We know that the Lord is coming so let’s pull ourselves together. Let’s stop speculating and let’s get to work. When it comes, let’s not huddle together like sheep but let the Lord find us living lives that are pleasing to Him. Let us live lives in the hope that whatever may come for us as believers, it is not a message of wrath because the wrath due to us has been taken by Another. What actions should we do then? We will talk about this more next week as we finish up 1 Thessalonians. I won’t be here but I did record a video that will take us through what I believe is the most practical section of the entire book of 1 Thessalonians so I hope that you will be able to be here for that. Let’s pray together.