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The Second Coming of Christ
While this truth could well have been discussed under the subject of Christology, it more appropriately belongs to Eschatology since it is a future event. This doctrine is also a defining truth separating between believers and apostates.
Who Believes
2 Peter 3:3-7 Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,4And saying, Where is the promise of his coming? for since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue asthey were from the beginning of the creation.5For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water:6Whereby the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished:7But the heavens and the earth, which are now, by the same word are kept in store, reserved unto fire against the day of judgment and perdition of ungodly men.
Men do not believe in the second coming of Christ because they do not believe Christ. This is the real reason why men do not believe in the second coming, and all other “reasons” derive from it. The doctrine of the return of Chris tis, in a singular sense, a test of orthodoxy in that it rests ultimately upon the word of Christ.[1]
To question the second coming of Christ is to question the integrity of the Scriptures themselves and even more significantly the integrity of Christ who proclaimed that He would come again. The scoffer falls into the trap of uniformitarianism, which is the philosophy that everything continues in the same progressive pattern with changes coming in such imperceptible increments as to require unthinkable amounts of time.
Like every other doctrine of the faith, the second coming is a proposition of faith. It is founded upon the revelation of God, the Scriptures. Those who reject the Bible reject its account of the judgment of God in the flood and consequently refuse the impending judgment to come. These are the false teachers referenced by Peter and Jude.
It is not possible to be a genuine believer without embracing the authority of Scripture. To receive and believe what the Bible says about Jesus Christ necessitates belief in the doctrine of inspiration and revelation. The only people who believe in the second coming are the same people who have been saved by the grace of God.
It should be noted that there are significant differences in position on the logistics and mechanics of the Second Coming, there is nonetheless unanimity on the fact that Jesus is coming again.
The fact of the second “coming” (Greek, Parousia) of Christ is uncontroverted among evangelical and Reformed believers. None doubt that Jesus will return (Acts 1:11).[2]
What is the Basis for Believing?
The Old Testament panorama of prophetic truth demands the Second Coming. While it has been often noted that the prophets saw the advent of Christ as one event, retrospect from the New Testament perspective makes clear that only part of the prophecies concerning Messiah were fulfilled in His first coming.
The “sufferings of Christ and the glory that should follow” were like to mountain peaks which, when viewed from a distance, might appear to touch each other, but as they are approached they are seen to be divided by a wife valley. The prophets wrote by inspiration of the Holy Spirit, but they did not always understand all they wrote (see Daniel 12:8,9). The “suffering” of Christ and the “glory” that should follow were subjects of the prophets, but those holy men of old did not always see the gap between the two mountain peaks of prophecy. That gap is the present dispensation of grace between the cross and the Glory of Christ. Even Christ stated that the prophets did not know the time elements related to the prophecies they wrote.[3]
It is important to observe that as before indicated, there is no separate treatment of either advent in the Old Testament, though the events related to each are never confused. There is no identification of one as removed in point of time from the other. As in the Second Psalm, the Messiah is first seen before the nations and their kings as One to be rejected, which attitude belongs to the first advent and those relationships which grow out of it. Later, and as indicated in verses 6-9, He takes His throne and becomes conquering Monarch of the whole earth. The remainder of the Psalm reverts to the first advent relationship wherein kings and rulers are admonished to make peace with the Son before His wrath is kindled but a little.[4]
In fact, there is a pre-flood prophecy of the second coming referenced by inspiration in the New Testament.
Jude 14,15 And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousands of his saints, 15To execute judgment upon all, and to convince all that are ungodly among them of all their ungodly deeds which they have ungodly committed, and of all their hardspeeches which ungodly sinners have spoken against him.
Isaiah well illustrates the point that the suffering Savior of Isaiah 53 is also the Son who has the government (rulership) upon His shoulder (Isaiah 9:6). This same person will rule the earth in which even nature itself will be radically different. The spiritual atmosphere will also be greatly altered.
Isaiah 11:1-9 And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots:2And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD;3And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears:4But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked.5And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins.6The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them.7And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox.8And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice’ den.9They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea.
The second basis for believing the Second Coming lies in the emphatic statements of Christ Himself. Unless you are prepared to accuse Him of self-delusion, you must accept the numerous promises He made.
John 14:1-3 Let not your heart be troubled: ye believe in God, believe also in me.2In my Father’s house are many mansions: ifit were notso, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you.3And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am,there ye may be also.
A. T. Robertson calls this a “futuristic present middle, definite promise of the second coming of Christ.”[5]
John 21:20-23 Then Peter, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved following; which also leaned on his breast at supper, and said, Lord, which is he that betrayeth thee?21Peter seeing him saith to Jesus, Lord, and whatshall this mando?22Jesus saith unto him,If I will that he tarry till I come, whatis that to thee? follow thou me.23Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, that that disciple should not die: yet Jesus said not unto him, He shall not die; but,If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee?
Matthew 24:30 And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven: and then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory.
At His interrogation by the Sanhedrin, Christ affirmed both His deity and His Second Coming.
Matthew 26:63,64 But Jesus held his peace. And the high priest answered and said unto him, I adjure thee by the living God, that thou tell us whether thou be the Christ, the Son of God.64Jesus saith unto him,Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.
In the final promise of the Bible, Jesus states that He will come again.
Revelation 22:20 He which testifieth these things saith,Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus.
If men are unwilling to receive the clear unequivocal words of Christ, they will not be convinced regardless of the evidence. Seeing is not believing; hearing is believing!
John 20:26-31 And after eight days again his disciples were within, and Thomas with them:then came Jesus, the doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said,Peacebe unto you.27Then saith he to Thomas,Reach hither thy finger, and behold my hands; and reach hither thy hand, and thrustit into my side: and be not faithless, but believing.28And Thomas answered and said unto him, My Lord and my God.29Jesus saith unto him,Thomas, because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed: blessedare they that have not seen, andyet have believed.30And many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book:31But these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing ye might have life through his name.
The third basis for believing the Second Coming lies in the sheer volume of references to the fact.
It may be said truthfully also that every writer there speaks of the Lord’s coming. If we accept every type and figure as well reference, they we may say that there is not a single book in the New Testament that does not speak of the Lord’s coming. It receives more attention than any other doctrine. You read there far more about it than you do about faith; you read there far more about it than you do about the blood of Jesus Christ that cleanseth from all sin; although both faith and the blood are absolute essentials. You read more about it than you do about even the great doctrine of love “without which all our doings are as nothing worth.”[6]
More space is given to the doctrine of the Second Coming of Christ, it is said, than to that of the atonement; where the atonement is mentioned once, the Second Advent is referred to twice. Where the first coming of Christ is mentioned once, that of His coming is mentioned eight times. Of the twenty-seven books in the New Testament, all but four of them refer to it. One out of every twenty-five verses in the New Testament makes mention of the Second coming.[7]
318 references to it are made in 216 chapters; whole books (1 and 2 Thess., e.g.) and chapters (Matt. 24; Mark 13: Luke 21, e.g.) are devoted to it.[8]
If we take the appropriate premise that emphasis upon any given subject should be proportion to the emphasis placed in Scripture, we ought to be talking about the Second Coming of Christ, all the time.
[1] Chester E. Tulga, The Case for the Second Coming of Christ, (Arlington Heights: Conservative Baptist Association of America, 1951), 13-14.
[2] James T. Dennison, Jr. in John H. White, The Book of books, Essays on the Scriptures In Honor of Johannes G. Vos, (Presbyterian and Reformed Publishing Co., 1978), 55.
[3] Lehman Strauss, God’s Plan for the Future, (Grand Rapids: Zondervan Publishing House, 1965), 67.
[4] Chafer, Systematic Theology, Volume 4, 305.
[5] A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, Volume V, (Grand Rapids: Baker Book House, 1932), 249.
[6] F. E. Howitt, The Coming and Kingdom of Christ, (Chicago: Bible Institute Colportage Association, 1914), 31.
[7]Bancroft, 318.
[8] Evans, 236.