This morning, we come in our study if God’s Word to a very marvelous and thrilling passage for Christians. And so I invite you to turn in your Bible to Matthew chapter 24 as we look at verses 29 through 31. A great text on the Second Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Those of us who know and love the Lord, and those of us who study His Word are very much aware of the fact that the world will end, the world as man knows it, the world as man runs it, will end with the glorious coming of Jesus Christ to earth from heaven. It is His Second Coming. The first time He came in humility. The first time He came to die on a cross. Next time He comes in glory and He comes to reign as King of kings and Lord of lords.
The Lord wanted to instruct His disciples on the matter of His Second Coming. And He specifically spoke of it in these three verses in Matthew 24. I want you to notice them as I read them. “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened and the moon shall not give its light and the stars shall from heaven and the powers of the heaven shall be shaken. And 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 on 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.”
There in very clear concise straight-forward understandable terms, the Lord Himself tells us about the greatest event in anticipation of any believer and that is the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. He came once, He will come again. In fact, as He was ascending, it tells us in Acts chapter 1, leaving the earth after His first coming, He ascended up into heaven, physically, bodily, taken away in a cloud. And two angels came and said, “This same Jesus who is taken up from you shall so come in like manner as you have seen Him go into heaven.”
In other words, as He went away, so will He return, physically, bodily in clouds. Just the way He went away. The very same Jesus in the very same way. And since that time, believers have had hearts filled with hope. Through all of the history of the church, looking for the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. In fact, the Apostle Paul in writing Titus said in chapter 2 verse 11, “The grace of God that brings salvation hath appeared to all men, teaching us that denying ungodliness and worldly lusts, we should live soberly, righteously, and godly in this present age, looking for that blessed hope, even the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ who gave Himself for us that He might redeem us from all iniquity and purify unto Himself a people of His own, zealous of good works.”
What he said there is we who are saved should live righteously, soberly, denying ungodliness, denying worldly lusts and looking for the glorious appearing of our great God and Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ. In other words, as much as we are to live obedient lives, as much as we are to live righteous lives, as much as we are to live lives where priorities are set by God’s standards, so much are we to live lives that focus on the return of Jesus Christ. We are to live in the light of the coming of Christ when this vile body, says Paul to the Philippians, shall be changed and made like His glorious body. That is our hope. That is our glory.
Now the world is very familiar with the circumstances and the features of Christ’s first coming. The world is very familiar with Bethlehem, with the manger, with shepherds and wise men and a star and Herod. The world is very familiar with Joseph and Mary and gold and frankincense and myrrh and a song of the angels. They pretty well have that story all down pat.
But the world is far less familiar with the story of His Second Coming with all of its features and all of its attendant circumstances. And yet the prophets have given us, including Jesus Himself, the greatest of all prophets, very clear instruction as to the character, the features of the glorious Second Coming of Jesus Christ. And in the three verses I just read to you, our Lord Himself describes His Second Coming. Not all of the elements of it, but the very moment that it occurs. The sign that it has arrived. And in that instruction there is so much that in one session we could never cover it all. As brief as His words are, typically, the Lord says very precisely and very concisely what He wants to say but has a way of opening up a universe of truth in the marvelous ability that He has to choose words.
And so, while we can read what we can read and understand it, it is beyond our ability to grasp the implications of all that He says and we feel like little children trying to understand complexity when we try to get all there is to get. But let’s see what the Lord will show us as we look at these three incredible verses.
Now the best way to go through this is just to sort of hang your thoughts on some key words, all right? The first key word is “sequence.” The sequence of the Second Coming, verse 29. “Immediately after the tribulation of those days.” Now you don’t have to be Phi Beta Kappa to figure that out, it’s pretty obvious. People say, “When is the Second Coming? When is the Second Coming?” It’s a very simple answer. Immediately after the tribulation of those days, that’s what it says. A very clear chronological indicator for us that the Lord’s Second Coming in glory to set up His Kingdom will follow immediately this time period called the Tribulation.
Now somebody says, “Well, there’s a lot of tribulation.” Tribulation is a Greek word thlipsis, it means trouble, difficulty, tribulation, distress. And you could say, “Well, Israel has always been in distress and tribulation and the church has always had distress and tribulation and the world has always had distress and tribulation and that’s why Jesus said immediately after the tribulation of those days. Not just any tribulation but the tribulation of those days. You say, “What days?” The days just described in verses 4 through 28. Those takes us back to some days that He has just described.
What are the days He’s just described? They are days of great tragedy. In fact, they are so severe that verse 21 says this, “For then shall be–not just tribulation, but what?–great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no nor ever shall be.” It isn’t just any tribulation, He’s referring to. It is the tribulation that is the worst tribulation the world has ever known. He’s referring to a period of time which is the worst period of time the world has ever undergone.
You say, “What period of time is that?” Well, it’s a period of time begun with a very special event. Verse 15, “When you see the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet stand in the Holy Place, whosoever reads, let him understand.” And we talked about the fact that that event called the abomination of desolation, it is a desecration of that which is sacred, it is a ruination of that which is dedicated to God, that triggers this great Tribulation period.
You remember what we said? Israel in the end time will be in their land. They will rebuild the temple. They will be worshiping God. They will be protected by the antichrist. But in the middle of the seven-year period that Daniel says he makes a pact with them. In Daniel 7 he says in the middle…pardon me, in Daniel 9 he says in the middle of that period, the antichrist will break the covenant and he will abominate, that is he will desecrate, he will blaspheme the sacred place of the Jews. He will tear out the altar to God and he will establish an altar to himself. He will make himself the God of the world. And this is described to us not only by the prophet Daniel but also by John in the Revelation. And he becomes the one to be worshiped and therefore he desecrates, he abominates. And when that happens, and he calls the whole world to worship him, then the signal has come that the tribulation has begun.
And the events of the tribulation are generally described in verses 4 through 14. It’s a time of deception. It’s a time of war. It’s a time of famine and earthquake. It’s a time of persecution and hatred. It is a time of false prophecy. It is a time when evil is so rampant that many people who appear to be religious will defect from religion and abandon themselves to evil. In other words, it’s going to be the worst time the world has ever known. It will be a time we see in verse 21 and following without an equal. And unless the days were shortened, that is the time of daylight was condensed, no one would survive. False prophets everywhere. And terrible sinful corruption described like the carcass of a dead animal in verse 28.
And so, there’s coming on the world this time of tribulation like no other time. A time of gross evil like no other time. A time of murder, a time of slaughter, and antichrist is going to try to slaughter all the Jews, he’s going to try to slaughter all those who would name the name of Christ. And that is why verse 16 says when you see this initiating event take place and the antichrist sets up his idol which is himself in the temple, then you better flee to the mountains, because Judea–where Jerusalem is–is going to be the center of his attack as he tries to wipe out God’s people Israel and any believing people from among the Gentiles who happen to be there.
So, it’s going to be such a time like no other time. You better run and you better run fast and hope you’re not pregnant and hope you’re not carrying a little baby and hope it isn’t winter and raining and hope it isn’t the sabbath so you get stoned by some legalists for running. You better hope you can get out because a slaughter is going to come like no slaughter in the history of the world. And we’ve gone through all that detail in the last few weeks.
“This article originally appeared here at Bible Bulletin Board.”
