Christ's Own Joy in His Second Coming
By Herbert J. Edmed
Looking Forward to the Day When He Can Take His Church to Himself— Such Surpassing Love Should Win Us
THERE is nothing more touching in the Bible narrative of our Lord's life on earth and in heaven than the evidences it gives of His earnest longing for the association of those for whom He died. LONGS TO BE WITH HIS PEOPLE
As Son of God, He was so infinitely superior to the highest angel, as well as to the best of men,—so much more holy, wise, powerful, and kingly,—that we who are accustomed to the class distinctions and the worship of royal genius common to this world, can never fully understand this trait in the Saviour's character. Yet it is a stupendous truth, as incomprehensible as it is sweet, that He who shrank from being separated from His Father in His humiliation and shame, could not endure the thought of separation from His people when He was to be honored and glorified. It is somewhat easy for us to grasp the idea that He could yearn for the companionship and sympathy of His brethren when He was here in the flesh as the Son of man. The faithful minister who has labored continuously to win souls for the kingdom, and who has passed through the disappointment of bringing people to the very gates of salvation, so to speak, and then seeing them turn back, can enter into the touching incident in which it is said, "From that time many of His disciples went back, and walked no more with Him." Such a one can know something of the earnest solicitude as the Master inquired of the loyal ones, "Will ye also go away?" His suggested appreciation of the solace He had found in the companionship of those who, He said, "have continued with Me in My temptations," was perfectly human. The sad incident of Gethsemane, when He wrestled with the immeasurable burden of the world's sin while His disciples slept, does not surprise us when we read that His fevered lips expressed in loving rebuke, "Could ye not watch with Me one hour?" These are all consistent elements of humanity. They serve to convince us that He was really and truly just like us, and as such, when under trial and temptation, yearned for kindred sympathy from those He loved. When we think of Him as the divine Son of God, however, possessing all the attributes of Deity, surrounded by ineffable glory, and companioned by His glorious Father and a retinue of sinless angels, then the sublime truth of His longing for human fellowship and association inspires us with inexpressible admiration. We stand entranced, and cry out, "Was ever love like this?" The apostle Peter tells us that the Old Testament prophecies were inspired by the "Spirit of Christ." 1 Peter 1:10, 11. When those sacred predictions were given, Christ lived in His Father's presence. He stood with God as the highest being in the universe. Heaven was His throne. The earth was only His footstool. The harmonies of heaven, in voicing His praise and holiness, resounded from the lips of ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands, of loyal, sinless beings. PROPHETIC PROMINENCE OF THE SECOND ADVENT
Yet His heart of infinite love for fallen humanity so yearned for them to be with Him, that in all the messages He sent by prophets, by far the greater number of references to Himself in the Old Testament are connected with the subject of His second advent. It has been stated that in the New Testament also from three hundred to four hundred times the Lord has spoken directly, or through agents, of His second coming in glory. Take the "Gospel of Isaiah," which was sent from glory. The fifty-third chapter, in describing His humiliation, says, "He shall see His seed," and "the travail of His soul." Paul takes up the strain, and names this "the joy that was set before Him." In other words, it may be said that the Saviour's contemplation of His second advent and the resultant association with His followers in glory, brought enough joy to His heart while He was on the cross, that it enabled Him to endure the suffering and despise the shame. Heb. 12:1, 2. IT WOULD COMPENSATE THE SUFFERING
Or again, while He was yet enjoying the bliss of heaven as Son of God, His love for our association was so great that He felt that the prospect of our being with Him in glory would amply compensate Him for all that He should suffer, and that the compensation would be stronger while on the cross than the suffering. That was love that is stronger than death. The joy with which He anticipated mingling with the redeemed in glory was really what fortified Him to endure dying in our stead. TO SHARE HIS GLORY IN HIS PRESENCE
Let us think often and long, too, upon those lover-words Jesus spoke just before He left this earth, when He and the disciples were fast reaching the parting of the ways: "Let not your heart be troubled. . . . I will come again, and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there ye may be also." John 14:1, 3. I am your lover, going only to prepare our home, and soon I will come back again and take you where we can be together. Just as fair maiden grieves not while her fiance is absent preparing the home, so His disciples must not be troubled; and like the young man, buoyed by the hope of some day bringing her to himself forever to be his, so, said Jesus, I will go, prepare the home, filled with the joy that soon I will have My own with Me. Then comes the prayer gift, "The glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them"; to be followed by the thrilling request that ascended to His Father, and which He can not refuse, "Father, I will that they also, whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am; that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me." John 17:22, 24. Such words are suggestive of the most eloquent love story. They breathe the divine Lover's longing for the time when His chaste virgin, the purified church, shall share with Him, as the Lamb's bride, the mansions of eternal glory. There is a significant statement of Paul's in Heb. 10:12, 13, which shows how much value the Lord now places upon His second advent from this standpoint. The apostle affirms that after Jesus had offered one sacrifice for sin, He sat down on the right hand of God. One would suppose that, having gained universal approbation and honor in His victory over sin, He would now think less of the ungrateful race that despised and rejected Him. We might have felt He was justified had He shown less affection for us. The severe contrast between the way we treated Him on this earth, and the honor and love He received in heaven, would have excused Him had His affection and ardor weakened. But it is not so. Paul adds those emphatic words, "henceforth expecting"—lover-like, longing for the final union, living only to intercede for and cleanse His spouse, until the Father can say she is ready.359 ALSO THE LORD'S BLESSED HOPE
No human emotion can express the intensity that is wrapped up in that word "expecting." It is from the Latin ex, out of, and specto, to behold; that is, to look with concern for a thing. O, yes, the "second coming" event is the dear Lord's blessed hope, as well as it is ours! It will be the time when the two lovers meet in bonds inseparable for eternity; when, "as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee." No human love could equal this. Such love is truly divine. The thought is wonderfully emphasized in a love-letter Jesus sent to His church, after He had ascended to His Father, and while in the expectant frame of mind and heart. The first chapter is still suggestive, for it says, "Behold, He cometh with clouds; and every eye shall see Him." The last chapter in its benediction echoes the promise, "Behold, I come quickly"; and in each chapter between, the Lord seems to count the days over and over again, recapitulating events that must first transpire, and then telling how long it will be. My heart responds in the words of the beloved disciple, "Even so, come, Lord Jesus." That hope is my hope also; and the thought that it is the hope of my Saviour, makes me long for it with an ever-grateful and increasing intensity.