HE IS COMING AGAIN!

"Surely I am coming soon."  (Revelation 22:20)

As we prepare ourselves to celebrate the birthday of our Lord and Savior, we all need to remind ourselves that Jesus is coming again! The word advent means "coming."  While we joyfully and eagerly look forward to His birthday celebration, let us never forget that Jesus is coming again to judge the living and the dead.

Most Christians celebrate Christ's first coming on December 25, but some Christians celebrate on January 6.  No one knows the date and time of His second coming (Mark 13:32).

His first coming in Bethlehem was joyfully announced by the angels as "good news of great joy that will be for all the people" (Luke 2:10).  The good news was that a Savior was born who would save us from our sins! The second coming of Jesus will occur unannounced.  For those who believe in Jesus Christ as their only Savior from sin, death, and the power of the devil, Judgment Day will be a day of incredible joy! We will rejoice at His second coming because He is coming again to take us to Himself in heaven.

As judge, on clouds of light, He soon will come again And His true members all unite With Him in heav'n to reign.  Amen

(Portals of Prayer - December 15, 2015)

Revelation 21:1 Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away. Also there was no more sea. 2 Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband. 3 And I heard a loud voice from heaven saying, "Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people. God Himself will be with them [and be] their God. 4 "And God will wipe away every tear from their eyes; there shall be no more death, nor sorrow, nor crying. There shall be no more pain, for the former things have passed away."

Psalm 48:1 A Song. A Psalm of the sons of Korah. Great is the LORD, and greatly to be praised In the city of our God, In His holy mountain. 2 Beautiful in elevation, The joy of the whole earth, Is Mount Zion on the sides of the north, The city of the great King. 3 God is in her palaces; He is known as her refuge. 4 For behold, the kings assembled, They passed by together. 5 They saw it, and so they marveled; They were troubled, they hastened away. 6 Fear took hold of them there, And pain, as of a woman in birth pangs, 7 As when You break the ships of Tarshish With an east wind. 8 As we have heard, So we have seen In the city of the LORD of hosts, In the city of our God: God will establish it forever. Selah 9 We have thought, O God, on Your lovingkindness, In the midst of Your temple. 10 According to Your name, O God, So is Your praise to the ends of the earth; Your right hand is full of righteousness. 11 Let Mount Zion rejoice, Let the daughters of Judah be glad, Because of Your judgments. 12 Walk about Zion, And go all around her. Count her towers; 13 Mark well her bulwarks; Consider her palaces; That you may tell it to the generation following. 14 For this is God, Our God forever and ever; He will be our guide Even to death.

Zechariah: 12:10-11  "And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn. 11 "In that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem, like the mourning at Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo."

Here, it is foretold that Christ should be pierced, and this scripture is quoted as that which was fulfilled when Christ’s side was pierced upon the cross (John 19:36-37 "36 For these things were done that the Scripture should be fulfilled, "Not one of His bones shall be broken." 37 And again another Scripture says, "They shall look on Him whom they pierced.)

He is spoken of as one whom we have pierced; it is spoken primarily of the Jews, who persecuted him to death (and we find that those who pierced him are distinguished from the other kindreds of the earth that shall wail because of him, (Rev. 1:7); yet it is true of us all as sinners, we have pierced Christ, inasmuch as our sins were the cause of his death, for he was wounded for our transgressions, and they are the grief of his soul; he is broken with the whorish hearts of sinners, who therefore are said to crucify him afresh and put him to open shame.

Those that truly repent of sin look upon Christ as one whom they have pierced, who was pierced for their sins and is pierced by them; and this engages them to look unto him, as those that are deeply concerned for him. 

This is the effect of their looking to Christ; it makes them mourn.  This was particularly fulfilled in those to whom Peter preached Christ crucified, when they heard it those who had had a hand in piercing him were pricked to the heart, and cried out, What shall we do”?

It is fulfilled in all those who sorrow for sin after a godly sort; they look to Christ, and mourn for him, not so much for his sufferings as for their own sins that procured them.  Note, The genuine sorrows of a penitent soul flow from the believing sight of a pierced Saviour.

(Matthew Henry Commentary