GOD’S CALENDAR
I think every home will have at least one calendar telling the family of coming events, marking the next birthday or when the school term ends and the holidays begin! They’re useful things to have so we know what’s going to happen. Do you think God’s got a calendar? I think He has, probably not like the one we have made up of 12 sheets, one for each month of the year, with little squares for each day. No, because God’s span of time covers the ages, a length of time beyond our understanding. But God in His wisdom and knowledge of everything has planned events in history according to a wonderful timetable for His creation. I’ve called it ‘God’s Calendar’. There’s a verse in the Bible which says, ‘There is a time for everything and a season for every activity under heaven’ (Eccles 3:1).
We can be sure that nothing has happened on Earth that wasn’t planned according to God’s Calendar of time, including the creation of the universe and then our own world. That was a long time ago but what especially interests me is God’s Calendar of events recorded in the Bible in connection with the climax of His revelation of Himself. One of the greatest days in God’s Calendar would be:
THE BIRTH OF JESUS
In our own calendars we would call this ‘Christmas Day’. The exact date of the birthday of Jesus is lost in history but the Bible tells us that God the Father had a special day in His Calendar: ‘But when the time had fully come, God sent his Son’ (Gal 4:4). God planned just the right time in history. The nation of Israel was in a bad state. It was occupied by the Roman army and under its control. Its religion had been corrupted by the High Priest and Pharisees. The prophets of Israel who had tried to turn the nation back to God were dead. The religions of Rome and Greece couldn’t give any hope for the future. So what did God do?
He chose a simple peasant girl called Mary to become the mother of the promised Messiah who would bring salvation to a sinful world, first to the Jews and then to all mankind. The birth was a miracle. Mary was engaged to be married to Joseph, the carpenter of Nazareth but they weren’t living together as man and wife. When Mary was told by the angel that she was going to have a baby, but no ordinary baby, she was puzzled, to say the least, and wondered how this could be true. ‘Do not be afraid, Mary,’ said the angel, who went on to say, ‘The Holy Spirit will come upon you … for nothing is impossible with God’ (Luke 1:30-35).
According to God’s timetable of events, at the time when the baby was due to be born, the Roman authorities had issued a decree that a census should be taken of the entire Roman world requiring everyone to register in their original town. Joseph’s great ancestor was King David and so the couple travelled to Bethlehem and it was there that Jesus was born in the humble surroundings of a stable as there was no room for them in the inn (2:1-7). Soon after His birth His parents became refugees. King Herod heard, from what we call ‘the Wise Men from the East’, that a king had been born and in his jealously and wickedness ordered that all the boy babies in the area should be killed. God alerted Joseph in a dream to the danger and the little family found safety in Egypt. The Birth of Jesus was a ‘red letter day’ in God’s Calendar, but only the beginning of a series of events that would change the world. The next key day in God’s Calendar was:
THE CROSS OF JESUS
The starting point of our Lord’s earthly ministry was the statement by John the Baptist that Jesus was ‘the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!’ (John 1:29). Jesus confirmed this by telling His disciples that ‘The Son of Man came … to give his life a ransom for many’ (Matt 20:28). His death on the Cross was in atonement for the remission of sins and reconciliation between God and man, no other penalty would be sufficient. The prophet Isaiah had announced hundreds of years before, ‘The Lord has laid on him (the Messiah) the iniquity of us all’ (53:6).
The scene on Calvary was a dreadful one. It was a place of torture. Think of how the Roman soldiers, having previously flogged Jesus, mocked Him and placed a crown of thorns on His head, then nailed Him to a rough cross-beam of wood, dropping it in a hole in the ground with a thud, and left Him to die. The pain was unimaginable but what was even worse was the spiritual agony of the Son of God as He cried out ‘My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?’ (Matt 27:46). It was the only way by which you and I could be saved from God’s righteous judgement. Jesus had come to do His Father’s will, showing that will to be a love going to the uttermost, reaching out into the very darkness of hell, plumbing the depths of human sin. That was a dark day in God’s Calendar but thank God the Cross of Jesus is not the end of the story because three days on in God’s Calendar is:
THE RESURRECTION OF JESUS
What is known on our calendar’s as ‘Easter Day’ is a most remarkable story. The resurrection of Jesus from the dead is the story of the impossible – a dead man rises. It’s the story of triumph over evil, as God demonstrates His victory over Satan, and it’s the ultimate story of love and forgiveness.
The Roman authorities made sure that Jesus was really dead. He was breathing no longer, but just to make sure, a soldier jabbed Him in the side with his spear and out gushed blood and water. So much for the theory that Jesus didn’t rise from the dead because he didn’t die, but only swooned and somehow revived in the coolness of the tomb! The chief priests recalled that Jesus had said, ‘After three days I will rise again’ (Matt 27:63). They were afraid that the disciples of Jesus might just steal the body and tell the people that He had risen from the dead. They went to Pilate, the Roman governor, and persuaded him to post a guard over the tomb after it had been sealed to the satisfaction of the religious hierarchy. It all seemed so final but the Apostle Peter in his first sermon claimed that ‘God raised him (Jesus) from the dead’ (Acts 2:24). Jesus gave the disciples the surprise of their life when He appeared to them and many others.
Well, how did it happen? Matthew tells us, "There was a violent earthquake, for an angel of the Lord came down from heaven and, going to the tomb, rolled back the stone." There’s a wonderful certainty to the event - and what’s more, a finality - for having rolled back the stone, the angel "sat on it" (28:2). But it wasn’t the rolling back of the stone that was the means of the resurrection - that was only the evidence of what had taken place. It was the power of God Himself who raised His beloved Son, Jesus, from the dead (Eph 1:20). Forty days after the Resurrection of Jesus God’s Calendar has another entry:
THE ASCENSION OF JESUS
Jesus had a bodily form of a human being, but now it was a changed, resurrection body, an altogether new form of existence. It was no longer subject to the laws of earthly physical values. On the evening of Easter Day Jesus, the gospel of John tells us: ‘the disciples were together with the doors locked for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood among them’ (20:19) and similarly a week later. The forty days after the resurrection, during which Jesus made many appearances to His followers, were a prelude to another important day in God’s Calendar
The ascension of Jesus is the completion of the cycle from the incarnation, as Jesus Himself predicted: ‘I came from the Father and entered the world; now I am leaving the world and going back to the Father’ (John 16:28). The manner of our Lord’s ascension is interesting and significant. Luke simply records what the disciples had told him: ‘He was taken up before their very eyes, and a cloud took him out of their sight’ (Acts 1:9). The onlookers were left gazing into heaven as He went and all too soon the ascending Saviour disappeared from their sight. Mark takes up the story confirming that Jesus ‘was taken up into heaven and he sat at the right hand of God’ (16:19). The crown of thorns was changed into a crown of glory; it was His coronation day.
The ascension stands for the final liberation of Jesus from all limitations of space and time, so now He is lovingly and powerfully present with every believer, in every place and in every age. The letter to the Hebrews teaches: ‘because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them’ (7:24,25). The Ascension of Jesus in God’s Calendar is closely linked with the next entry:
THE DAY OF PENTCOST
Jesus’ final words to His disciples before He ascended into heaven were: ‘Do not leave Jerusalem, but wait for the gift my Father promised … in a few days you will be baptised with the Holy Spirit’ (Acts 1:4,5). God’s Calendar ten days on from the ascension, the coming of the Holy Spirit, was the climax of the great festivals of the coming of the Messiah – His Incarnation, His Passion, His Resurrection and His Ascension. Pentecost, as it’s known on our calendars, was amazing and perplexing. The 120 disciples gathered together were in a state of shock at the suddenness of the great event accompanied by three supernatural signs: ‘a sound like the blowing of a violent wind’; a strange sight: ‘what seemed to be tongues of fire’; and strange speech: ‘to speak in other tongues,’ languages previously unknown to the speakers (2:2,3). The whole group of disciples were ‘now filled with the Holy Spirit’ (2:4).
They were so full of what had happened that their native language was inadequate to express what was within them and they found themselves declaring the wonders of God in languages other than their own. The bystanders, people from all over the Middle East, were gathered in Jerusalem for the Jewish festival of the Feast of Harvest because it celebrated the completion of the grain harvest and took place 50 days after the Passover. It’s no wonder that these God-fearing Jews ‘asked each other, “What does this mean?” Some, however, made fun of them and said “They have had too much wine’ (2:12,13). Peter acted as spokesman for the disciples and explained ‘This is what was spoken by the prophet Joel: “In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people”’ (2:17).
When God makes a promise, He keeps it. The promise of the Holy Spirit being poured out previously announced by Isaiah (44:3) and Ezekiel (36:27) and confirmed by Jesus (John 14:16) was fully met on the Day of Pentecost. The whole purpose of the coming of the Holy Spirit was made clear by Jesus in His final words to His disciples as He awaited His ascension, ‘You will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses … to the ends of the earth’ (Acts 1:8). It was their commission to proclaim the gospel of redemption through Jesus, sharing their faith under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. The Day of Pentecost, like the other days in God’s Calendar, is unique and unrepeatable as an event, but the blessing of each continues and every believer is called upon to receive the riches of God’s grace. Our checking through the days in God’s Calendar have taken us from our Lord’s birth, passion, ascension and sending of the Holy Spirit but we still have one more date to think about. It is:
THE SECOND COMING OF JESUS
Is this a day in God’s Calendar? It most certainly is. It is the final act in God’s programme of events – the Day of the Lord (2 Peter 3:12). The disciples who witnessed the ascension of Jesus appeared to be transfixed at the sight but were soon brought down to earth by two angels who appeared alongside them: ‘Why do you stand here looking into the sky? This same Jesus … will come back in the same way you have seen him go into heaven’ (Acts 1:11). The first generation Christians faced tremendous opposition from the Jews who had rejected Jesus as their Messiah and also from pagan authorities who resented the call to repent and believe in Jesus as the only way to eternal life. How could belief in a man’s death and alleged return to life be the means of salvation? It just didn’t make sense to them! It often made them insecure and, if converts affected their style of life, they turned against this strange sect in great persecution. In such circumstances Christians found the promise of Christ’s return a ‘blessed hope’ (Titus 2:13). The question is ‘When will He return?’
Christians have troubled themselves by the timing of the Second Coming. We read in Paul’s Letter to the church at Thessalonica that some believers thought that Christ’s Second Coming was so imminent that they stopped working and had to be given a stern warning by the apostle against idleness and told to ‘settle down and earn the bread they eat’ (2 Thess 3:12). In contrast to this, the apostle Peter warned of false teachers who poured scorn at the apparent delay in the Lord’s return, saying ’Where is this coming he promised?’ (2 Peter 3:4). The believers were told, ‘Do not forget, dear friends: With the Lord a day is like a thousand years, and a thousand years are like a day. The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise’ (3:8).
Other mistaken thinking is seen in those well-meaning Christians who choose to ignore the clear statement by Jesus that no-one knows the day or the hour of His return, ‘not even the angels in heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father’ (Matt 24:36). Much ink has been spilt in making confident prophecies with ingenious calculations and formula. Inevitably the dates have gone by, leading to revised theories, only to come to grief and disillusionment that comes from disappointed hopes and unwarranted predictions. We must be careful not to read in Scripture something which isn’t there at all! Jesus said He didn’t know the date of His Second Coming. We can be sure nobody else does. Only God the Father Himself knows this date on His Calendar!
God is working to His own timetable of events. The Old Testament Scriptures had accurately predicted the events, although not the dates, on God’s Calendar of His Birth, Cross, Ascension, sending the Holy Spirit, for which Christians are profoundly thankful, and now eagerly await The Second Coming of Jesus. In the meantime Christians are called upon to live out their daily lives in constant readiness for our Lord’s return and certainly for His call. In the words of a hymn, ‘So now to watch, to work, to war and then to rest for ever.’
