The great event of the future is the second advent of our Lord Jesus Christ.The Scriptures plainly declare that this advent will be personal,visible,sudden and unexpected,glorious and triumphant.(The Momentous Event,W.J.Grier).

1.Personal.The N.T.teaches that our Lord will come in person.The Lord himself shall descend from heaven.

2.Visible.His first coming was literal and visible,and we may be sure that His second coming will be literal and visible too.’This same Jesus,which is taken up from you into heaven,shall so come in like manner as you have seen him go into heaven’(Acts 1:11);His second coming is to be as visible as His ascension.’Then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven:and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn,and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.And he shall send his angels with a great sound of a trumpet,and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds,from one end of heaven to the other’(Matt.24:30,31).

The late Dr.R.V.Bingham once held the common doctrine of a secret appearing of the Lord and a secret rapture of the saints,but,on being asked by his wife for a proof-text,he found that he could not produce one.There are plenty of texts on the other side.Surely if it were to be secret,it would not be ‘with a shout,with the voice of the archangel,and with the trump of God’(1 Thess.4:16).

3.Sudden and unexpected.Speaking about the word ‘apocalypse,’or ‘revelation’, of  the Lord,used in the N.T. for his second coming,Dr.Geerhardus Vos says that the ‘very idea of suddenness and unexpectedness seems to be intimately associated with the word.’(Pauline Eschatology,p.79).It is as if a curtain were suddenly flung aside and the Lord of glory revealed.His coming will be ‘as a thief in the night.For when they shall say,Peace and safety;then shall sudden destruction cometh upon them’(1 Thess.5:2,3).The Saviour Himself said that His coming would be ‘as  the lightning’(Matt.24:27)—-as sudden,and as universally visible.None will forsee it and all  will see it at once.What a warning this should be to careless sinners and to slack,easy-going professors of religion.(The Momentous Event.p.10).

4.Glorious and Triumphant.

The contrast is often drawn in the New Testament between the two appearings of our Lord.He came in the body of his humiliation,but He will come in the body of His glory (Heb.9:28).He ‘took the form of a servant,’but when He comes again’every knee shall bow’to Him(Phil.2:5-11).He came to be rejected and killed,but He will come again ‘in His own glory and the glory of His Father and of the holy angels’(Luke 9:22-26). He came as a child but He will come as King of kings and Lord of lords,victorious over every foe )Rev.12:5;19:11-16).

One of the common New Testament words for Christ’s ‘coming’ would be more properly translated ‘arrival.’The New Testament writers recognised indeed that Christ had already arrived,but ‘the arrival,’ the epochal coming,the one fully worthy of the name,belonged to the future.They had an intensively prospective outlook–for them the momentous event is the coming of the Lord.

Another word for His second coming—–’the revelation’-is used in the same way,as if this,rather than His first coming,was the revelation par excellence.

Another term for it is ‘the day’—’the night is far spent,the day is at hand’ (Rom.13:12).When He comes,darkness will vanish forever for His own,and deliverance,joy,and blessedness will be ushered in.Indeed,His second advent is described as ‘our redemption.’

J.A.Bengel says beautifully (Acts 1:11) ‘Between His ascension and His coming no event intervenes equal in importance to these: therefore,these two are joined together.Naturally,then,the apostles….set them the day of Christ as very near.And it accords with the majesty of Christ that during the whole period between His ascension and His advent,He should without intermission be expected.’

It is characteristic of the saints in the Old Testament that they looked for the consolation of Israel,Christ’s first coming.Now,’this is pinned as a badge to the sleeve of every true believer,that he looketh for and longeth for Christ’s second coming’ (John Trapp).The New Testament keeps this great event constantly before our minds and urges it on our attention,that we may be active,earnest,patient,joyful,and holy.

In Steinbeck’s book,”Travels with Charley.”In search of America,he shares an experience he had in visiting a local church in Vermont. Sunday morning,in a Vermont town,my last day in New England,I shaved,dressed in a suit,polished my shoes,whited my sepulcher,and looked for a church to attend.Several I eliminated for reasons I do not now remember,but on seeing a John Knox church I drove into a side street and parked Rocinanate out of sight,gave Charley his instructions about watching the truck,and took my way with dignity to a church of blindingly white ship lap.I took my seat in the rear of the spotless,polished place of worship.The prayers were to the point,directing the attention of the Almighty to certain weaknesses and undivine tendencies I know to be mine and could only suppose were shared by others gathered there.

The service did my heart and I hope my soul some good.It had been a long time since I had heard such an approach.It is our practice now,at least in the larg cities,to find from our psychiatric priesthood that our sins aren’t really sins at all but accidents that are set in motion by forces beyond our control.There was no such nonsense in this church.The minister,a man of iron with tool steel eyes and a delivery like a pneumatic drill,opened up with prayer and reassured us that we were a pretty sorry lot.And he was right.We didn’t amount to much to start with,and due to our own tawdry efforts we had been slipping ever since.

Then ,having softened us up,he went into a glorious sermon,a fire-and- brimestone sermon.Having proved that we,or perhaps only I,were no damn good,he painted with cool certainty what was likely to happen to us if we didn’t make some basic reorganizations for which he didn’t hold out much hope.He spoke of hell as an expert,not that mush-mush hell of these soft days,but a well stoked-white-hot hell served by technicians of the first order.

This reverend brought it to a point where we could understand it,a good hard coal fire,plenty of draft,and a squad of open hearth devils who put their hearts into their work,and their work was me.I began to feel good all over.For some years now God has been a pal to us,practicing togetherness, and that causes the same emptiness a father does playing softball with his son.But this Vermont God cared enoug about me to go to a lot of trouble kicking the hell out of me.He put my sins in a new perspective.Whereas they had been small and mean and nasty and best forgotten,this minister gave them some size and bloom and dignity.I hadn’t been thinking very well of myself for some years,but if my sins had this dimension there was some pride left.I wasn’t a naughty child but a first rate sinner,and I was going to catch it.

I felt so revived in spirit that I put five dollars in the plate,and afterward,in front of the church,shook hands warmly with the minister and as many of the congregation as I could.

All across the country I went to church on Sundays,a different denomination every week,but nowhere did I find the quality of that Vermont preacher.He forged a religion designed to last,not predigested obsolescence.

Seon Mi and Haley visited us in July.

Hottubreligion’s editor of the Baptist Co-hear has just announced that mega pastor,Ronnie Floyd will be the new Chief executive officer of the Southern Baptist’s executive committee  in September,2010.Floyd will replace Morris Chapman who has been frightened into retirement by the Great commission resurgence team led by Arminians,Floyd and Hunt.

Ronnie Floyd is imminently qualified to lead our convention back to the pre 1925 era before the C.P. became the means of supporting our convention financially.Floyd’s church gives almost nothing to the C.P.and like his hero,Hunt proclaims that it is the dollar amount(pre-1925 plan) that is given to the C.P. that will rescue our failing and fallen convention.

Floyd will,no doubt,have the full endorsement of  former calvinists,Tom Ascol  and flaming Arminian,Jimmy Carter.

So…Good bye Chapman and hello Floyd!!

Here is a cry of need that should touch the heart of each of us:

I was hungry and you formed a humanities club and discussed my hunger.Thank you.

I was imprisioned and you crept off quietly  to your chapel and prayed for my release.

I was naked and in your mind you debated the morality of my appearance.

I was sick and you knelt and thanked God for your health.

I was homeless and you preached to me of the spiritual shelter of the love of God.

I was lonely and you left me alone to pray for me.

You seem so holy,so close to God.But I’m still very hungry and lonely and cold.

Source unknown