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.
No 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