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
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(Today’s Reading)
The Biblical Case for the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact
(Book Installment 60)
Part Three – The Nature of the Second Coming
Chapter 9 – How the Apostles Explained the Prophets
Relating to Things Spiritual and Physical (continued)
The whole movement of the New Testament was a weaning of the people of God from a physical orientation to a spiritual one. With the resurrection, a spiritual emphasis was firmly established. Messiah was to reign from heaven, not earth; that is, from where He could not be physically seen. Some of the early converts wanted to go back to physical things, like circumcision. Paul had to ask them, “Having begun by the Spirit are you now being perfected in the flesh?” (Galatians 3:3)
We could similarly ask, having begun with faith in a resurrection we could not see, are we going to be perfected by a return that we can see? If Jesus had showed up physically in the 1st Century A.D. we could easily imagine some of the idol worshipers taunting the Christians, saying something like, “See, we told you so; God is best worshiped in the flesh with a physical image!”
Does God have to appear in the flesh before we will obey Him? If we intend to be more reverent and devoted when He appears in the flesh than we are right now, what does this say about us? What does it say about our faith?
As we have said, God is mindful of our plight. He knows we live in a physical as well as a spiritual world. For this reason, Jesus gave His disciples earthly physical signs that would precede His coming. But if all the earthly signs were fulfilled, and it has been confirmed by the apostles in the New Testament that they were, then do we not have all the more reason to believe Him about the heavenly things? For He said to Nicodemus,
“If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?” John 3:12
We cannot appreciate all the glory associated with Jesus’ Second Coming if we do not first acknowledge how right he was about earthly predictions He made. But He has gently led us this way, giving us a ladder to heaven, as it were. If we trust and follow the signs he has left in the physical realm (remember God’s creative miracles and Jesus’ redemptive miracles) then we can find our way to and through the spiritual realm.
In Matthew 24-25 Jesus referred to a great gathering of the saints. If this is to be physical then God will have to violate the physical laws of heaven and earth that He Himself created, for no physical sight can appear worldwide at the same time; at most, it could be view by one hemisphere, and probably only half of that. Since God is God and can do anything He wants, it is possible that he could alter or abolish all His physical laws and accomplish even this, but do you now think this is His intent? Is it not more consistent with His nature, His workings, and His plans that the gathering is to be spiritual; that is, to Him…in our hearts…not to some physical display.
(This section of the chapter to be continued tomorrow.)
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