Sermon on the Second Advent.
“Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen Him go into heaven.”—Acts 1 : 11. THESE men of Galilee were the disciples of our Lord. They were standing upon the Mount of Olives. Their eyes were turned heavenward to catch the last glimpse of their ascending Master. These words of our text were addressed to them by the two angels who stood beside them at the moment. Angels had heralded the first advent and had sung the song of redemption over the cradle of the infant Saviour. Angels came and ministered to him in the wilderness, after Satan had exhausted upon him all the resources of his craft in tempting him. An angel from heaven strengthened him in the garden, when he wrestled alone in bloody agony. And now as he ascends into heaven, angels are present to comfort his disciples. The disciples naturally gazed up after their departing Master. But their attention was speedily called back to earth. Two men stood by them, clad in white garments, and addressed to them the words of our text. I. The first thing you will notice is that these words contain a promise. It is that the Lord Jesus Christ shall appear again upon this earth. We are told that when he left his disciples on the Mount of Olives, he did not bid a final adieu to this world. He, who once became the babe of Bethlehem, lived a life of humiliation, died in shame upon the cross, and has now ascended to his Father—“this same Jesus” shall once more re-visit this earthly scene of his sufferings and triumph. But we have not only the word of the angels that he will come again; the Lord Jesus himself explicitly declares the same thing. Turn to the 24th and 25th chapters of Matthew. There you find, in his own words, an account of how this present gospel age is to close. It is to be brought to a close by the return of the Lord in power and glory. He tells us that when the time of the end shall have come, “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” (Matt. 24 : 30). In continuation of the same discourse, he says that “when the Son of man shall come in his glory, and all the holy angels with him, then shall he sit upon the throne of his glory, and before him shall be gathered all nations” (chap. 25 : 31). In the same connection, also he tells us that his second coming shall be sudden and unexpected: “As the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and given in marriage until the day that Noah entered into the ark, and knew not till the flood came and took them all away, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be. . . . Watch therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth come” (chap. 24 : 36–39, 42). And we find this warning repeated in Luke: “Be ye therefore also ready; for the Son of man cometh at an hour when ye think not.” Luke 12 : 40. This prophecy was NOT FULFILLED AT THE DESTRUCTION OF JERUSALEM. The Son of man did not then appear visibly, with his angels, in power and glory. All nations were not gathered before his Judgment throne. He has not yet separated the righteous from the wicked, as a shepherd divides his sheep from the goats. These events are still future. They relate to the same time spoken of in the parable of the tares. “The good seed are the children of the kingdom; the tares, the children of the wicked one; the enemy that sowed them the devil; the harvest, the end of the world; the reapers the angels. As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it be in the end of this world. The Son of man shall send forth his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire; there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.” Matt. 13 : 37–42. I would also like to call your attention to another passage—the passage where Christ speaks of being ashamed of those who are ashamed of him: “Whosoever therefore, shall be ashamed of me and my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him also shall the Son of man be ashamed when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels” (Mark 8 : 38). You see that it is not here and now that he will be ashamed of such a one; it is not at death; it is not immediately after death; but it is “when he cometh in the glory of his Father with the holy angels.” Now these teachings of Christ by themselves are sufficiently clear and positive. But it may help us to know how the apostles, who were under his immediate instruction, understood them. Paul tells us that the Lord Jesus Christ “shall be revealed from heaven, with his mighty angels, in flaming fire, taking vengeance on them that know not God, and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ” (2 Thess. 1 : 7, 8). Speaking of the resurrection of the dead and the change of the living, he says that “we which are alive and remain unto the coming of the Lord shall not prevent them which are asleep. For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God; and the dead in Christ shall rise first; then we which are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air.” 1 Thess. 4 : 15–17. And again, he says that “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, and we shall be changed” (1 Cor. 15 : 51, 52). To all this we may add the express statement of the apostle that, “To them that look for him, he shall appear the second time without sin unto salvation” (Heb. 9 : 28); that is, he shall not appear to become a sacrifice for the sins of men; and he shall appear unto salvation,—to bring to his people their final and eternal redemption. This is the testimony of Paul. Now let us turn to Peter. We hear him exhorting the Jews after this manner: “Repent, be converted, that your sins may be blotted out when the times of refreshing shall come from the presence of the Lord, and shall send Jesus Christ, which before was preached unto you, whom the heavens must receive until the times of restitution of all things” (Acts 3 : 19–21); and he exhorts all Christian people: “Gird up the loins of your mind, be sober, and hope to the end for the grace that is to be brought unto you at the revelation of Jesus Christ.” 1 Pet. 1 : 13. The testimony of the apostle James is equally positive. Listen to his admonition: “Be patient, brethren, to the coming of the Lord. Behold the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it till it receive the early and the latter rain. Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh.” James 5 : 7, 8. To the same effect the apostle John exhorts us: “And now little children, abide in him, that when he shall appear we may have confidence and not be ashamed before him at his coming.”—1 John 2 : 28. And in the opening of the Revelation we hear him making the announcement to the world, on the direct authority of Christ himself: “Behold he cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and all the kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him.” But, my friends, there is no need to multiply quotations to prove that the New Testament contains the promise of the return of Jesus Christ to this earth. You will find this truth stated over and over, from the opening of the gospel to the end of Revelation. It is the great focal point of this dispensation. It is the gleam of its coming glory, which lights up the gospel with the glow of a heavenly splendor. It is the great event to which the minds of the apostles and disciples constantly turned when they thought of their heavenly inheritance. And if you will turn to your Testaments simply with a desire to know the truth, you too will come to know that the greatest fact which is taught in that precious word, after the forgiveness of sins, is the return of Jesus Christ to earth from Heaven. II. The next thing I wish you to notice about the second coming of Christ is, that it will be LITERAL AND PERSONAL.
As it is foretold in the New Testament, it is not a figurative or spiritual coming. It is something very different from a mere flourish of rhetoric to express the spiritual presence of Christ at the hour of death. “This same Jesus which is taken up from you into Heaven shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into Heaven.” When Jesus left his disciples on Olivet gazing up after him, it was the literal, personal, corporeal Jesus who went into Heaven. The Jesus who rose from the grave, was the same Jesus that hung on the cross and was buried by Joseph and Nicodemus in the sepulcher. He convinced his disciples of this fact by challenging their bodily senses. He showed his person to them, and they looked upon him with their eyes. He spoke to them, and they heard his voice. He presented to them his wounded hands, and side, and feet, and appealed to their sense of touch: “Handle me and see; for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have.” For forty days, between his resurrection and ascension, this same literal and corporeal Jesus mingled with the disciples. In that same body which rose from the grave he ascended into Heaven, where he is now enthroned, a personal Saviour. And in that same glorified personality, divine and human, literal, corporeal, visible, he “shall so come, in like manner” as he went into Heaven. Would you like to catch a glimpse of his glorious person? Then with Peter, James, and John, go up with him into the mount where he is transfigured. See his divine glory as it shines out for a few moments from his person. Stand in the light of that heavenly splendor. It is so overpowering that you too would fain fall to the ground upon your face. That glory which dazzles your sight and over-masters your human strength, is the divine glory of the Son of God. In that glory you will behold him when he shall come in the clouds of heaven, in the power of his Father at the last great day. You remember the parable of the talents. The Lord has now committed to his servants their talents, five, two, one, according to their several ability. He has taken his journey into a far country where he is gone to receive a kingdom. Some of these servants are now slothful, and have buried their talents. Some have sent after him the message, “We will not have this man to reign over us.” But at the hour appointed of his Father, he will return to reckon with his servants, and to render to every man according to his deeds. While there are some passages which speak of the presence of Christ by his Spirit, there is not one in the whole New Testament which speaks of the second coming of Christ at the close of the gospel dispensation as anything else than as a real, actual and literal event. There is not one solitary passage which teaches that it is to be nothing but an impersonal and spiritual coming. On the contrary they all look to a real and personal appearing; to a certain and definite point of time,—when he shall be revealed from Heaven with his angels, and every son of Adam shall behold him and stand before him. III. We further learn from the New Testament that the second coming of Christ is intimately related to the state in which men are finally to exist in eternity.
Which the gospel sets before the people of God is the return of the Lord. The hope of the gospel is not a hope for death. We are not taught to look to the grave to bring us to everlasting bliss. And we are not taught to look forward to some ethereal, intangible, spiritual, and disembodied state immediately after death as the consummation of our Christian anticipations. This is not the fruition of the saints which the gospel promises. No; the hope of the gospel is “the coming of the Lord.” We are taught to be “looking for that blessed hope and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ.” Tit. 2 : 13. Do you remember what was Paul’s hope as he was about to go out to his bloody death?—“I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness which the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day”—not at death, but at that day—“and not to me only, but also unto all them that love his appearing.” 2 Tim. 4 : 8. The hopes and promises of the gospel take a definite and tangible shape when Peter tells us that “when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory which fadeth not away.” 1 Pet. 5 : 4. There is something certain and real when he assures us that there is, “an inheritance incorruptible, undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in Heaven for you who are kept by the power of God, through faith, unto salvation ready to be revealed in the last time.” 1 Pet. 1 : 3, 4. And the apostle comforts us, that though we may be in affliction now, yet our faith, being tried and found much more precious than gold that perisheth, “might be found unto praise, and honor, and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.” 1 Pet. 1 : 5. Listen to the exhortation of the apostle Paul: “If ye then be risen with Christ, seek those things which are above, where Christ sitteth at the right hand of God. Set your affections on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God. When Christ, who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory.” Col. 3 : 1–4. And also the apostle John: “Beloved, it doth not yet appear what we shall be; but we know that when he shall appear, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is.” 1 John 3 : 2. We take our stand in the light of God’s revelation, and prolong our vision across the boundary of time to the day of final consummation; and there we see before us a life as real, tangible, and personal as the life we are now living. If we are one with Christ here, we shall be one with him in glory. When he comes in glorious majesty to assume his kingdom, to take his scepter, and to reign as King of kings and Lord of lords, we then shall enter into all his joys. “For if we be dead with him, we shall also live with him; if we suffer, we shall also reign with him; if we deny him he also will deny us.” 2 Tim. 2 : 11–12. But again, the second advent of Christ is THE TIME OF FINAL RETRIBUTION
To an ungodly world. When the curtain of death falls upon this earthly scene of our lives, the boundary line is then crossed which marks the limits of the pardoning love of God. Beyond that it will not go. But our effect upon the world and our influence upon others does not stop when we leave this earth. Though dead, we live on still. If our lives have been wicked and sinful, we live on for evil till the end of time. The final summing up will take place when all the actual deeds of this life with all their consequences, can be reckoned up together. But when the Son of man shall come in his glory with his angels, and shall sit upon his throne of judgment, and all nations shall be gathered before him, then every man shall receive according to his deeds. “The Lord Jesus shall judge the quick and the dead at his appearing and his kingdom.” 2 Tim. 4 : 1. “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the things done in his body according to that he hath done, whether it be good or bad.” Rom. 14 : 10; 2 Cor. 5 : 10. And then, the apostle declares, “when the Lord Jesus shall be revealed from Heaven with his mighty angels,” he shall take “vengeance on them that know not God and obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, who shall be punished with everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord, and from the glory of his power.” 2 Thess. 1 : 7–9. My friends, we shall all stand in that awful presence in our own proper persons. Our own eyes shall see the King, and our ears shall hear his voice. If we have believed on him here we shall then enter into life; if we have not obeyed his gospel we shall depart from his presence into darkness and death. There is to be “a day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God.” Rom. 2 : 5, etc. The great question with every one should be: What am I treasuring up against that day of retribution? Is it “indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish?” Or am I now seeking “for glory, honor, and immortality,” the reward of which is “eternal life?” You remember what Jude says about the angels that kept not their first estate,—that they are “reserved in everlasting chains, under darkness, unto the Judgment of the great day.” And when we too come down to the hour of death, we shall look forward to that great and terrible day of the Lord either with unspeakable terror and dread, or else we shall fall peacefully to sleep in Jesus, in the full assurance of a blessed resurrection and “the life eternal through Jesus Christ our Lord.” IV. It is natural that men should ask WHEN THIS GREAT EVENT IS TO TAKE PLACE.
But that is a matter which is still among the secret purposes of God, and which he has seen fit nowhere to reveal in his word. He has reserved this knowledge expressly to himself, so that the precise hour of our Lord’s return no man knoweth. But the warning words of Jesus Christ come ringing in our ears, “Behold, I come quickly.” He is not waiting to give time for some fancied triumph of human progress. He does not delay his coming to enable the race to develop some ideal civilization, and reach some golden era of earthly blessedness. He is now waiting to give the nations time to repent. This is the day of grace. He is now consummating his purposes of mercy. He would have his gospel preached in all the world, to every creature. He would have his people publish the glad tidings of salvation in all the earth. He is now gathering to himself an innumerable company “out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation.” When all these things shall have been accomplished, then Christ will come to end this reign of sin and bring in the everlasting glory. Shall we ask, then, “Watchmen, what of the night?” Are there signs of the coming morning? Yes, there are signs that the world is moving forward towards the day. The fig-tree is even now almost budding as the token of the fast-approaching spring. And now, in respect to the second advent of Christ, let me ask you: Do you love his appearing? Does it send a thrill of satisfaction to your heart to think that you shall see the Lord Jesus revealed in glory? Does it comfort and cheer you to remember that Jesus is to come again to take you to himself? If Christ is to become your Saviour, then your heart should kindle into a flame of love and longing, when you think that he will soon return,—that he shall then fully redeem you from all the consequences of sin—that he will deliver you from the power of death—that he will bring you into full and everlasting salvation. Again, suppose Jesus Christ were to be revealed from Heaven this very day: Would you be prepared to meet him? Could you abide his presence? Would the sight of him gladden your heart? And are you certain that you would receive from him a welcome and a crown of life? If any of you are in doubt in this matter, then you had better make your calling sure without delay. You may die before he comes; but at the end you shall stand before him. You will meet him then in just that moral state in which you left this life. Your life may end at any moment. You cannot tell what instant your heart may cease to throb. Your only safety is to lay hold at once of eternal life through Jesus Christ. In him you are safe; out of him you are in peril every hour. “May the very God of peace sanctify you wholly; and I pray God that your whole spirit, and soul, and body be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” 1 Thess. 5 : 23.—Rev. W. H. Congdon (Presbyterian).