A man once asked the Lord what a million years was like to Him. The Lord responded, “It is just a minute in my sight.”
“How about a million dollars?” the man asked. “It can’t mean more than a penny to you.”
“That’s right,” the Lord said. “A million dollars is but a penny in my sight.”
“Then,” said the man, “How about giving me a penny.”
“Sure,” said the Lord, “In a minute.”
2,000 years ago, Jesus said, “I am coming soon.” But His definition of “soon” seems to be a whole lot different than mine. If you have your Bibles, I invite you to turn with me to Revelation 22, Revelation 22, where we might gain some insight into what he meant when he said, “I am coming soon.” Revelation 22, look at vs.7 “Behold, I am coming soon!” Skip down to vs.12 “Behold, I am coming soon!” Now look at vs.20 “Surely I am coming soon.” There is no question…
JESUS IS COMING SOON.
Jesus is coming quickly. He is coming without delay.
But God’s time-table is a whole lot different than ours. 2 Peter 3 says, “But do not overlook this one fact, beloved, that with the Lord one day is as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day. The Lord is not slow to fulfill his promise as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance” (2 Peter 3:8-9).
From our perspective, Jesus has delayed His coming to give everyone a chance to repent. But from God’s perspective, Jesus hasn’t delayed His coming at all. It has only been “two days” since He made that promise.
Even so, I believe Jesus is coming very shortly. At no other time in history has the stage been so well set for the events described in the book of Revelation.
Now, for those events to happen, three sets had to be in place: 1st, Israel had to be established as a nation again; 2nd, The Roman Empire had to rise out of the ash heap of history; and 3rd, The Babylonian Empire had to come alive again, as well.
Well, that’s exactly what we have seen in OUR lifetime. 1st, Israel became a nation in 1948, and she regained control of the city of Jerusalem in 1967. She is also ready to rebuild the temple. The materials have been gathered, the priests have been trained, and the plans are all laid out. 2nd, The nations that were once a part of the old Roman Empire are coming together again, in what is today called the European Union. And 3rd, The Babylonian Empire is making a comeback in the nation of Iraq, which is the site of ancient Babylon. We see it every day in the news as they try to reestablish themselves with support from the west – exactly the scenario described in Revelation 17 & 18.
Throughout most of the 20th Century, all of these things were unthinkable. Babylon was just a dessert. The Cold War put an Iron Curtain right down the middle of the ancient Roman Empire, irreparably dividing east and west, and the descendants of Israel were scattered all over the world.
Now, in the 21st Century, these things are not only possible! They are happening right before our very eyes. Yes! I believe Jesus is coming very shortly.
And when He does, He will come suddenly. He will come in a flash, with no forewarning whatsoever. For when Jesus said, “I am coming soon,” he not only meant shortly, but suddenly as well. The Bible says, it will happen “in a flash, in the twinkling of an eye” (1 Corinthians 15:52).
For several years, we home-schooled our children, and sometimes mom had to be gone for several hours. On those days, she would carefully lay out their assignments and say to our children before she left, “Be done your schoolwork by the time I get home.”
Well, the children would start well, but soon other things became more interesting than spelling or math. Eventually, they would drift to playing with their toys, fighting each other, or finding other ways to occupy their time.
Then, they would hear the noise of mom’s car coming up our gravel driveway. They made a mad dash to their desks and got right back to work. They thought they could fool their mom into believing that they had been working all the time.
Well, that won’t be the case when Jesus comes back. When He returns, there will be no time to scramble back to the work He’s called us to do. We won’t be able to fool Him, because His coming will be sudden.
Jesus is coming soon. That is, He is coming shortly and suddenly. Therefore, we better do what He told us to do. We better…
KEEP HIS WORD.
We better observe it and preserve it until he does come.
Revelation 22:7-9 Jesus said, “And behold, I am coming soon. Blessed is the one who keeps the words of the prophecy of this book.” I, John, am the one who heard and saw these things. And when I heard and saw them, I fell down to worship at the feet of the angel who showed them to me, but he said to me, “You must not do that! I am a fellow servant with you and your brothers the prophets, and with those who keep the words of this book. Worship God.” (ESV)
Don’t worship the angels. Worship God and keep His Word like the angels do. That word, “keep,” is used of prison guards who keep watch over their prisoners (Matthew 27:36, 54). It is used of protectors who keep watch over their charges in order to preserve them from harm (John 17:11ff). And it is used of the pious who keep watch over the law. In other words, they observe God’s Word in order to obey it. And that’s exactly what Jesus wants us to do with His Word. He wants us to keep watch over it to preserve it and to practice it until He comes.
But He doesn’t want us to keep it to ourselves.
On the contrary, Jesus wants us to proclaim his word. He wants us to get His Word out.
Revelation 22:10 And he said to me, “Do not seal up the words of the prophecy of this book, for the time is near. (ESV)
Jesus is coming soon, so let everybody know what’s going to happen before it is too late.
Revelation 22:11 Let the evildoer still do evil, and the filthy still be filthy, and the righteous still do right, and the holy still be holy.” (ESV)
In other words, after Jesus comes, it will be too late to change. Those who are doing evil will continue to do evil, and those who are doing right will continue to do right.
So NOW is the time to trust Christ with your life. NOW is the time to turn your life over to Him. NOW is the time to let Him begin the process of changing you from the inside out, because after He comes, it will be too late. Then, you won’t be able to change even if you wanted to, because there are no second chances in eternity.
Several years ago (2005), the New York Times published an article titled, “How to Get Out Alive: What the Science of Evacuation Reveals About How Humans Behave in the Worst of Times.” The article describes what researchers have learned from disaster survivors about evacuation.
In the case of the doomed Twin Towers, those who made it out waited for an average of six minutes before evacuating. Some lingered as long as half an hour, milling about. The article said, “Many called relatives. About 1,000 took the time to shut down their computers… [and] At least 70 percent of survivors spoke with other people before trying to leave.”
One woman, Elia Zedeno, who was on the 73rd floor of Tower One, “heard a booming explosion and felt the building actually lurch to the south, as if it might topple.” But instead of fleeing, she had the opposite reaction. “What I really wanted,” she said, “was for someone to scream back, ‘Everything is okay! Don’t worry. It’s in your head.’”
Fortunately, she heard somebody screaming, “Get out of the building!” and she was able to escape. Later, she was wondering, “What would I have done if [that] person had said nothing.” (Amada Ripley, “How to Get Out Alive,” Time, 5-2-05, pp. 58-62; www.PreachingToday.com)
Jesus is coming soon! Now is NOT the time to say nothing. People’s lives are on the line, and we cannot afford to keep quiet. Instead, shout it as loud as you can. Broadcast it until everybody knows the way out. Proclaim God’s Word until Jesus comes again.
More than that, practice god’s word. Do what He says. Observe it in your own life.
Revelation 22:12 “Behold, I am coming soon, bringing my recompense with me, to repay each one for what he has done. (ESV)
Or better, “My payment is with me to give to every one as his work is.” In other words, when Jesus comes, he is coming with the pay checks, and everybody will get paid according to the quality of his or her work. If the work is acceptable, then there is a great reward. If the work is not acceptable… Well, the Bible says, “the wages of sin is death.”
Revelation 22:13 I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end.” (ESV)
Jesus is the eternal God; and as such, He has the authority and the power to determine the eternal destiny of every individual in this room. So, what is it that He wants us to do?
Revelation 22:14 Blessed are those who wash their robes, so that they may have the right to the tree of life and that they may enter the city by the gates. (ESV)
Only those who are clean can enter the pearly gates. Sinners are left outside.
Revelation 22:15 Outside are the dogs and sorcerers and the sexually immoral and murderers and idolaters, and everyone who loves and practices falsehood. (ESV)
What does Jesus want us to do? Well, 1st, He wants us to be clean from sin. That’s what He means when He says, “Blessed are those who wash their robes.” He is not talking about doing the laundry. He is talking about getting rid of the dirt in our lives.
The only problem is we cannot clean up the dirt all by ourselves. A man was staying in a motel in a foreign country where he noticed that the floor was awfully dirty. He was about to demand that it be scrubbed. Then he noticed it was a dirt floor, and scrubbing it would only make it worse (Spurgeon). Lord knows, we’ve tried to clean up the dirt in our lives, but it only gets worse, doesn’t it? That’s because we are trying to scrub a dirt floor. We’re trying to mop up a sinful nature and it just doesn’t work.
What we need is a new life, a new nature. What we need is to be born again, and that only comes by trusting Christ. We have to depend on Jesus to make us clean.
The Bible says, “The blood of Jesus, [God’s] Son, purifies us from all sin” (1 John 1:7). Nothing else will do it – no amount of scrubbing, no amount of good intentions, no amount of religious activity. Nothing else can make us clean except the blood of Jesus Christ, shed for us on the cross.
All we need to do is come to Him. All we need to do is ask Him to clean us up.
Revelation 22:16 “I, Jesus, have sent my angel to testify to you about these things for the churches. I am the root and the descendant of David, the bright morning star.” (ESV)
Jesus is David’s source as well as his son – the Messiah. He is the Bright Light in a dark sky, whose appearance means the dawning of a new day for this world.
Revelation 22:17 The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price. (ESV)
Eternal life is free. All we need to do is come to Jesus. All we need to do is say “Yes” to Him.
Tedd Kidd was five years older than Janet. He finished college before her, and started to work in a city hundreds of miles from her. They always seemed to be at different places in their lives, but they had been dating for seven years. Every Valentine's Day, Tedd proposed to her. Every Valentine's Day, Janet would say, “No, not yet.”
Finally, when they were both living in Dallas, Texas, Tedd decided he would try just one more time. He bought a ring, took Janet to a romantic restaurant, and got ready to propose for the last time. Another “no” would mean that he had to get on with his life without her.
After the salad, entree, and dessert, it was time. Tedd screwed up his courage, but since Janet had a gift for him, he decided to wait. “What did you bring me?” he asked.
She handed him a box the size of a book. He opened the package and slowly peeled away the tissue paper. It was a cross-stitch Janet had made which simply said, “Yes.” (Rubel Shelly, Nashville, Tennessee; story told at Janet's funeral after 17 years of marriage to Tedd; www.PreachingToday.com)
God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit are wooing and pursuing sinners all the time, inviting us to come spend eternity with Him. Please, don’t put it off any longer. Just say “yes” to the Lord today. Come to Jesus, and let Him clean up your life. Please, do it today before it is eternally too late, because Jesus is coming very soon!
He is coming, and He wants to find us keeping His Word. Proclaim it. Practice it.
And finally preserve it until he comes. Don’t change God’s Word in any way. Don’t add to it or take anything away.
Revelation 22:18-19 I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book: if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book, and if anyone takes away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which are described in this book. (ESV)
The liberal theologians want to take away the miracles. The cult groups want to add their own doctrines. But either one destroys us for all eternity.
Trail magazine is popular among British and European mountain climbers, because it is designed to inform them of the tools they need to explore what they call “the most beautiful, spectacular and challenging [mountain] regions of Britain and Europe.”
For example, their February 2004 issue provided directions for climbers descending Britain's highest peak, the Ben Nevis, at 4,409 feet. It’s not like taking a walk on a well-marked path in the park. No. Descending the Ben Nevis requires explicit instruction, especially in bad weather, so the article gave step by step advice on navigating the trial down.
The problem was the directions were wrong. If a person followed those directions in poor visibility, he or she would end up walking off the north face of the mountain, dropping 1,000 feet into the Gardyloo Gully.
When confronted with the error, the editor of Trail blamed it on a production error. He said, “There is a simple explanation. A sentence was missed from the article.” And he promised that “a correction would be placed in the March issue.” (“The Quickest Way to Gardyloo Gully,” news.telegraph.co.uk, 1-22-04; www.PreachingToday.com)
A sentence was missed, and the result could have been deadly! So it is when we take anything away from the Bible (or add to it). The result is deadly not just in this life, but for all eternity.
We might not like what the Bible says about sin and judgment. Or we might wish that the Bible taught wealth and prosperity for every believer. But if we add to or take anything away from God’s Word to make it fit what we like, we lead ourselves and others into spiritual ruin.
Jesus is coming soon, so keep His Word. Proclaim it, practice it, and preserve it just as it is. Then you will be ready when He comes.
In her book about the Eiffel Tower, Jill Jones tells the story of a very wealthy American newspaper publisher named James Gordon Bennett, who started The New York Herald in 1835. Bennett had two lavish apartments in Paris, plus a French country estate and a yacht harbored in Europe. He also had three homes in the United States, even though he hadn't lived in the country for over ten years.
However, the servants in each of his homes always needed to be prepared for Bennett's unexpected arrival. Jones wrote: “Each [house] was fully staffed, ready to serve Bennett should he stride in the front door unannounced – the wine cellars were kept stocked, fires roared in the grates, and sheets were turned down nightly.” (Jill Jones, Eiffel’s Tower, Viking Adult, 2009, p. 199; www.PreachingToday.com)
Tell me. If Jesus were to return unannounced today, would He find YOU ready for Him?
