Jesus prepares the faithful, and those who would heed his warning, to avoid the severity of God’s judgment by observing the signs and seeking shelter. Joel 2:38 reads, And it will come about that whoever calls on the name of the LORD Will be delivered; For on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem There will be…
Then shall he say also unto them on the left hand, Depart from me, ye cursed, into the eternal fire which is prepared for the devil and his angels.” How can the mention of “eternal fire” apply to the national judgment against Israel? Jude discusses a judgment against false teachers and illustrates how God punished…
We have been applying Matthew 25 to the judgment of the great day or the great and terrible day of the Lord that Joel concerning which Joel prophesied. This post will focus on verses 34-40. Then shall the King say unto them on his right hand, Come, ye blessed of my Father, inherit the kingdom…
When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. He will place the sheep on his…
Some may object that Jesus never came on the clouds of heaven and that this language can apply only to a final return. Yet, the Bible speaks many times of divine beings “coming on the clouds of heaven,” in passages that speak of unusual events that have already occurred. Even though there is no report…
If the apostles didn’t ask Jesus about such a coming in Mathew 24 and he didn’t teach about it, what about the judgment scene described in Matthew 25.31-46? This is the same judgment of the dead in Revelation 11:18, which is later referred to as the “first resurrection” (Rev. 20:5). It was going to “shortly…
In evaluating the questions that the disciples asked Jesus in Matthew 24, they could not have been asking Jesus about His return in some distant future to end the world and judge all mankind. First, they could not have been asking Jesus about signs of the end of the world because they refused to believe…
A third reason that the second coming of Christ taught in the New Testament cannot be the final judgment day is because the judgment spoken in connection with Christ’s return was escapable, while the final judgment taught among a majority of churches today is not escapable. The great a terrible day of the Lord that…
Consider some reasons why his return cannot refer to a final judgment day and the end of the world at some distant future. (1) Time-Defining Terms Logically speaking, how can we define the end of the age in Matthew 24 to refer to the end of time when Jesus comes to judge the world and…
As already noted, Matthew’s account looks like he may be asking three questions. Some would say that He distinguishes the destruction of Jerusalem and a final return in answering the last two questions. Adherents to this view either make verse 29 or 36 the point of transitioning from a discussion of the question of authority…