Finding Jesus in the Bible…So We Can Follow Him in Life
Bible Reading Plans
- Plan One: New Testament Only
- Plan Two: New Testament + Psalms
- Plan Three: New Testament + History
- Plan Four: The Entire Bible – Year 1 of 3, Year 2 of 3, Year 3 of 3
Don’t know which plan? Go to A Christ-Centered Bible Reading Plan: Quick Start.
Extras
Verse of the Day, Audio Capsule, and Video Minute
***
(Today’s Reading)
The Biblical Case for the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact
(Book Installment 35)
Part Three – The Nature of the Second Coming
As we have said, the New Testament’s scheduling of the Second Coming of Christ for sometime late in the 1st Century A.D. only presents a problem to those who insist that Jesus was promising to show up in a fleshly body similar to the one He left in. However, the prophetic descriptions of the Second Coming in the New Testament add up to a spiritual, not a physical, event. And this is consistent with the whole movement and direction of the New Testament which is to wean the people of God from a physical orientation to a completely spiritual one.
Fleshly people do not welcome spiritual explanations. Let us not be like those Paul had to chastise in Corinth.
And I, brethren, could not speak to you as to spiritual men, but as to men of flesh, as to infants in Christ. I gave you milk to drink, not solid food; for you were not yet able to receive it. Indeed, even now you are not yet able, for you are still fleshly. For since there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not fleshly, and are you not walking like mere men? 1 Corinthians 3:1-3
Chapter 7 – How the Bible Describes Truth
From Flesh to Spirit
The apostle John candidly shows us in his Gospel how he and his contemporaries were constantly misunderstanding Jesus. The most common type of misunderstanding was that Jesus would be speaking of something spiritual when they thought He was speaking of something physical.
In John 2, for example, Jesus says to the Jews in Jerusalem who opposed Him, “Destroy this temple, and in three days I will raise it up.” They thought He was speaking of the physical structure that was the pride of Jerusalem, but, as John tells us, “He was speaking of the temple of His body.”
In John 3, the teacher Nicodemus reacts to Jesus’ use of the term “born again” by protesting that a man “cannot enter a second time into his mother’s womb and be born.” Jesus then explains that there are things of the flesh and things of the spirit; and each produces after its own kind. We might understand this distinction better in our day by using the terms visible and
invisible. Most people recognize that there are these two dimensions of creation. Nicodemus couldn’t get his mind out of the visible dimension long enough to fully appreciate the invisible dimension.
In John 4, Jesus asks a woman at a well for some water and then proceeds to tell her that He Himself has some “water” for her. It is obvious to us now that His “water” was spiritual water meant to quench spiritual thirst. When His disciples returned and encouraged Him to have something to eat, He kept up the “nourishment” metaphor saying, “I have food to eat that you do not know about.” The first thing to their minds was not spiritual but rather, they say, “No one brought Him anything to eat, did he?” Jesus then explains that the “food” He eats is “to do the will of Him who sent Me, and to accomplish His work.” Jesus then goes on talking about sowing and reaping and a harvest that is not four months off but rather ready now. John does not say if any of them thought He was contemplating that they should change their occupations from fishing to farming.
(To be continued tomorrow)
***
A Bible Reader's Website 