Part 5 - Questions of Interest Relating to the Coming of Christ and His Reign on Earth

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“It is said, with the greatest confidence, that it was a mistake of the Thessalonian saints to be expecting the coming of the Lord; and that this is proved by the second epistle to that church, in which it is declared that the day of Christ is not at hand, or near; and that there must come a falling away before that event can happen. How is this difficulty to be removed? How can we be expecting the Lord at any time if something must happen first?”
That it is the duty as well as the privilege of the Christian to be expecting the coming of the Lord at any moment is quite clear from other passages. Take for instance Luke 12:35-3735Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; 36And ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. 37Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching: verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them to sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them. (Luke 12:35‑37): “Let your loins be girded about, and your lights burning; and ye yourselves like unto men that wait for their lord, when he will return from the wedding; that when he cometh and knocketh, they may open unto him immediately. Blessed are those servants, whom the lord when he cometh shall find watching.” Clearly the attitude of such servants is to be always ready, so that they can open the door immediately. Blessed are the servants found watching. All this would be entirely nullified if it were true that certain occurrences must take place before the return. Then we might be looking for some event to happen, let it be what it might, but we could not be expecting the Lord, for He would not be coming until after that event, whereas Scripture puts nothing between. “We look for the Saviour.”
We are like virgins that have already gone forth to meet the bridegroom: surely not because He is not to be expected; but because the proper attitude of the Christian is to be watching for and expecting His coming. This, indeed, is the blessed hope of the Christian, and not our dying and going to the Lord, blessed as that is. When Paul wrote the first Epistle to the Thessalonians he records how God had turned them from idols to serve the living and true God; and to wait for His Son from heaven (1 Thess. 1:9-109For they themselves show of us what manner of entering in we had unto you, and how ye turned to God from idols to serve the living and true God; 10And to wait for his Son from heaven, whom he raised from the dead, even Jesus, which delivered us from the wrath to come. (1 Thessalonians 1:9‑10)). If this waiting had been a wrong thing, would he not have corrected it then and there? But instead of this, he thanks God for them, for they had become examples to other believers, and the word of the Lord had sounded out from them; and indeed it was God Himself who had turned them... to wait for His Son from heaven. It is impossible therefore that it could be a mistake on their part to be thus waiting.
Neither is this waiting for Christ from heaven in any way said to be a mistake in the second epistle. It is well known that many think it is so; but it is because they do not distinguish between “the coming of the Lord,” and the “day of the Lord” (as 2 Thessalonians 2:22That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. (2 Thessalonians 2:2) should read), which are two totally different events. What can be a happier thought for the Christian than to be hoping for the Lord to come and take him and every other saint on earth and in the tombs to be forever with and like the Lord Himself? Well may the apostle add, “Wherefore comfort one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:1818Wherefore comfort one another with these words. (1 Thessalonians 4:18)). Whereas “the day of the Lord” is connected with judgment. Let us look at a few of the passages: “Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and He shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it” (Isa. 13:99Behold, the day of the Lord cometh, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate: and he shall destroy the sinners thereof out of it. (Isaiah 13:9)). “Let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand: a day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains” (Joel 2:1-21Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in my holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand; 2A day of darkness and of gloominess, a day of clouds and of thick darkness, as the morning spread upon the mountains: a great people and a strong; there hath not been ever the like, neither shall be any more after it, even to the years of many generations. (Joel 2:1‑2); see also Joel 3:14-1514Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision: for the day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. 15The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. (Joel 3:14‑15)). “The day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat; the earth also, and the works that are therein, shall be burned up” (2 Peter 3:1010But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in the which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also and the works that are therein shall be burned up. (2 Peter 3:10)). Now if we turn to the second Epistle to the Thessalonians, we find that someone had been troubling the saints (by a false epistle or message) and teaching that because they were in tribulation therefore the day of the Lord had come, or was present (as it should read in 2 Thessalonians 2:22That ye be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand. (2 Thessalonians 2:2)). The apostle tells them that the day of the Lord could not come before the revelation of the Antichrist, the man of sin, whom the Lord when He comes in judgment will destroy with the brightness of His coming. And further, he tells them that though the mystery of iniquity was at work, yet the Antichrist could not then be revealed because of Him whose presence hindered; but He would be taken away, and then the man of sin could be revealed, and would be destroyed by the Lord Himself.
The apostle reminds them that he had told them these things; but the enemy had come in with false teaching, and the saints were in distress. The passage gives an awful description of the end of those who now will not believe the truth; then they will believe a lie, and will perish with the one who will have been the instrument of their apostasy.
But all this is entirely different from the blessed hope God sets before His saints, and with which He bids them encourage one another. “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. 15:51-5251Behold, I show you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed, 52In 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 Corinthians 15:51‑52)). “The Lord Himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God” (1 Thess. 4:1616For 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: (1 Thessalonians 4:16)), and then we shall all be caught up together to meet the Lord in the air, and so shall we ever be with the Lord.” May we all be looking for this blessed event, the coming of our Lord, and be found ready and watching when He shall come.