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 Implications of the Second Coming as Accomplished Fact
(Book Installment 12)
The Scope of the Second Coming
Chapter 1 – References to the Second Coming
References to the Second Coming in Daniel (continued and concluding)
Notice that Daniel’s 7:13-14 prophecy portrays the Son of Man not coming down to earth, but rather coming up to “the clouds of heaven.” What irony! But this is the way it is with prophetic riddles (like “The stone that the builders rejected became the chief cornerstone” in Psalm 118:22). That is, the prophecies can seem to contradict themselves. The answer to prophetic riddles come when the event prophesied occurs (like Jesus being raised from the dead revealed the fulfillment of Ps 118:22). And when the prophetic riddle is fulfilled, all seeming contradictions vanish…because that’s the way riddles work. The Second Coming revealed how Jesus could be “coming up” and “coming down” at the same time: He was filling the heavens and the earth, revealing Himself to be the one true God. This is one of the major implications of the Second Coming. (Much more on that later in this book.)
Going back to the two major prophecies Jesus invoked at His trial (Psalm 110:1 and Daniel 7:13-14), consider that the first put Him at the right hand God from where He would rule the church, while the second portrayed Him receiving the eternal kingdom of “all the peoples, nations and men of every language,” which, of course, expanded His rule to the entire world. This would be the coming of the kingdom of God – that for which the church was fervently waiting. Today’s church doesn’t want to admit that this happened because they would no longer be in charge. This is another of the major implications of the Second Coming. (Much more on this as well later in this book.)
Consider now some selected verses from the final chapter of Daniel’s book, all pointing to the Second Coming and its finality.
Daniel 12:4 “But as for you, Daniel, conceal these words and seal up the book until the end of time; many will go back and forth, and knowledge will increase.”
Daniel 12:8 As for me, I heard but could not understand; so I said, “My lord, what will be the outcome of these events?”
Daniel 12:9 He said, “Go your way, Daniel, for these words are concealed and sealed up until the end time.
Daniel 12:13 “But as for you, go your way to the end; then you will enter into rest and rise again for your allotted portion at the end of the age.”
(We see language like this in the Gospel of Matthew. For example, see “the end” in Matt 10:22; 24:6, 13, 14. And see “the end of the age” in Matt 13:39, 40, 49; 24:3; 28:20.)
As we saw in the book of Isaiah, the Second Coming was no small thing. Daniel agrees. In his seventh chapter, he portrays it as the entire creation being handed off from “the Ancient of Days” to “One like a Son of Man,” and here in his final chapter as “the end…” All the prophets agree. The magnitude of the Second Coming – the coming of the kingdom of God – was going to be beyond human imagination. The more we learn about the Second Coming, the more we come to appreciate its massive scope. It was the end of one world and the beginning of another. And the new world would have no end. That’s the world we’re living in. (Much more on this, too, later in this book.)
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