SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR
1/8/2015 8:23 AM
My Worship Time Focus: The Glory of the Second Coming
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Revelation
1:7b-d
Message of the
verses: I would like to finish up
looking at the rest of the seventh verse of the first chapter of Revelation in
today’s SD.
The Glory of the Second Coming (Revelation 1:7v): “with
the clouds.”
In order to see why clouds are a part of the glory of the
second coming we will have to look at a few different verses from Scripture to
see how clouds were used to show the glory of God. In the books of Exodus and also Numbers we
see that as the children of Israel were traveling out of Egypt to the Promised
Land that they were covered by a cloud in the day time to keep the heat off of
them and also a fire at night to keep them warm. (Ex. 13:21-22; 16:10; Num. 10:34.) When the Law was given at Mt. Sinai the
mountain was covered in a thick cloud which symbolized God’s presence. When the Lord was speaking to Moses in the
Tent of Meetings it was covered in a cloud.
After both the Tabernacle and the Temple were built they were filled
with the glory of the Lord in a cloud, so much so that no one could enter
either of them. In Acts chapter one we
see that Jesus left the earth in a cloud:
“And after He had said these
things, He was lifted up while they were looking on, and a cloud received Him out of
their sight (Acts 1:8).”
The Rapture of the church is described in 1 Thessalonians 4:17 “Then we who are alive and remain will be caught up
together with them in the
clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall always be with the
Lord.”
MacArthur adds “The clouds picture Christ’s descent from
heaven. More significantly, they
symbolize the brilliant light that accompanies God’s presence—a light so
powerful that no one could see it and live (Ex. 33:2). The appearance of the blazing glory of Jesus
Christ, ‘the radiance of [God’s] glory
and the exact representation of His nature’ (Heb. 1:3), and the lesser
brilliance of the innumerable angels and the redeemed who accompany Him, will
be both an indescribable and terrifying pageant.”
The Scope of the Second Coming (Revelation 1:7c): “and
every eye will see Him, even those who pierced Him; and all the tribes of the
earth will mourn over Him.”
We have mentioned before that when Christ came the first
time to planet earth His glory was veiled as He came as a baby and grew up to
be a man just like all of us. We read
about a glimpse of His glory showing when He was on the Mr. of Transfiguration
where Peter, James, and John saw this unfold along with Moses and Elijah who
came down from heaven to be with Him representing the Law and the
Prophets.
As we look at this portion of verse seven we see that
John divides up the people who will see Christ when He returns into two groups:
“those who pierced Him” and this does not refer to the Roman soldiers, but to
the unbelieving Jews. Zechariah 12:10 “"I will pour out on the
house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace and of
supplication, so that they
will look on Me whom they have pierced; and they will mourn for Him, as
one mourns for an only son, and they will weep bitterly over Him like the
bitter weeping over a firstborn.’”
When Peter gave his first sermon on the Day of Pentecost he charged the
Jews with killing Jesus and then in another time from Acts 3:14-15 we read “14
"But you disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked for a
murderer to be granted to you, 15 but put to death the Prince of life,
the one whom God raised from the dead, a fact to which we are witnesses.” Now as we look again at the passage in
Zechariah we see true repentance from the Jews as they mourn over what their
ancestors did to their Messiah and many will be saved. Many Jewish people will be saved in the
Tribulation Period as we will later see John speak of the 144,000 Jewish
evangelists who will spread the good news of the Gospel during the Tribulation
Period. Paul writes in Romans that “all
Israel will be saved,” and this refers to a time in the Tribulation
Period.
Now John describes a second group “all the tribes of the
earth,” and this is a reference to the unbelieving Gentile nations. Not unlike the Jews they too “will mourn
over” Christ. MacArthur writes the
following “Mourn is from kipto, which
literally means ‘to cut.’ The word
became associated with the mourning due to the pagan practice of cutting
themselves when in extreme grief or despair.
First Kings 18:28 records that the frenzied, panicked prophets of Baal, ‘cut themselves according to their custom
with swords and lances until the blood gushed out of them’ in a desperate
attempt to get their god’s attention,” but the Jews were forbidden to do
this when they were mourning. He writes
this to show that many of the Gentiles of that day will not have believed on
the Lord and so they will mourn when they see him. Now there will be many, many Gentiles saved
during the tribulation period.
The Response to the Second Coming (Revelation 1:7d): “So
it is to be. Amen.”
This response actually comes from the apostle John after
giving the response to both the believers and the unbelievers. He is using the strongest response of
affirmation from the Greek language.
MacArthur writes “(nai; so it
is to be) and Hebrew (amen), John pleads for the Lord Jesus Christ to return.”
Spiritual meaning
for my life today: When I was a
little boy I decided to run away from home, and one of the things that I wanted
to take with me was a Bible. I wanted to
take a Bible so that I could read about what happened in the gospels to Jesus
after he was raised from the dead. Now
when we read the gospels about this we don’t see a whole lot, mostly we see
from John’s gospel about this, but all in all there is not too much. Now as I am looking again at the book of
Revelation I can see much more to what has and will happen to Jesus Christ
after He was raised from the dead for the theme of the book of Revelation is
the second coming of Jesus Christ and so as we read through and continue to
study this book we will see what the Lord is doing after His resurrection from
the dead.
My Steps of Faith for Today: To love the Lord with all of my heart, soul,
and strength, and to understand better the love that He has from me.
Memory verses for the week:
2 Peter 1:5-8.
5 Now for this very
reason also, applying all diligence, in your faith supply moral excellence, and
in your moral excellence, knowledge, 6 and in your knowledge, self-control, and
in your self-control, perseverance, and in your perseverance, godliness, 7 and
in your godliness brotherly kindness, and in your brotherly kindness,
love. 8 For if these qualities are your
and are increasing, they render you neither useless nor unfaithful, in the true
knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Answer to yesterday’s Bible
question: “well doing “ (2 Thessalonians
3:13).
Today’s Bible
question: “Who tempted Jesus?”
Answer in our next SD.
1/8/2015 9:17 AM
No comments:
Post a Comment