Theme: He will gather His chosen from the four winds
Text: Dan. 12:1-3; Heb. 10:11-14; Mark 13:24-32
Everyone would like to know his or her future. Although many people would not admit it the first thing they read in the papers or magazines is the horoscope. Many people also very often search for information about their future by consulting all types of so-called specialists – the spiritualist, the fetish priest or any person who claims that he or she has access to such knowledge. The search for this kind of knowledge is a worldwide phenomenon. It is a very sad commentary of our day that many people, no matter their level of education, would believe almost anything even when it defies commonsense. They often see the people involved in such practices as very spiritual and would even pay them for their services. Is it any wonder that claiming and pretending to have such knowledge and being able to deal with future problems has become a profession or way of life for some people? Unfortunately this practice affects many people in very negative ways. Some years ago an elderly couple consulted a psychic about their future. They were told that the man would have gambling debts in heaven and the only way to prevent it from happening was to pay the debt in advance. This psychic through this ungodly prediction managed to get his hands on the life savings of the couple. Luckily for the couple the news came out and the psychic was arrested, prosecuted and jailed and some of the money retrieved. He could not foretell his own future in jail. This is not an isolated case but unfortunately many cases remain stories because the affected people are so scared of offending the people making the predictions that they take no action against them. A person was actually told that when he left the world he would be condemned to walk around naked because the owner of the clothes they would bury him with would claim it and take it away from him. The only way for him to avoid this embarrassment was to present clothes to the one making the prediction. Why are people so interested in seeking such knowledge anyway? It is simply because human beings want to be prepared for the future. But should this mean that we should go around looking for people who make predictions about the future? What we should be doing is to be concerned about what God has revealed and not concerned about what He has not revealed. We should be concerned about the fact that Christ will return and He will gather His chosen from the four winds.
We should be concerned about God’s divine will and purpose for creating us. We should be concerned about God’s desire to have beings of like-mind and like-heart to share His life with. Not only did God create us He also saved us. The price was not cheap and it cost God all He had. He knows His chosen ones and gave them the Holy Spirit to enable them live a life that glorifies His name. Since the Holy Spirit is God, we literally have God living in us. We are actually walking here on earth with heaven in us.
God has a people is a theme that runs throughout Scripture and almost all-biblical prophecy is based on it. Biblical prophecy has been fulfilled and is being fulfilled. The festivals of the Jews are a timetable for the fulfilment of prophecy. The prophecies celebrated in the festivals of the Passover, the First Fruits and Pentecost has already been fulfilled. At His resurrection Jesus presented some of His chosen ones to the Father as the first fruits. This is comparing what took place at the resurrection of Christ to the ceremony of presenting the first fruits of the harvest to the Lord as ordained for the Israelites under the Law. The sheaf of the first fruits waved before the Lord was a picture of Christ coming from the dead as the sinner’s representative and as the beginning of a new creation. The sheaf of the First Fruits was the first complete fruit to rise up out of the seed that had been planted or buried earlier. It was to be waved before the Lord on the day after the Sabbath. The waving of the first fruits was an act of worship and of triumph for the appearing of the first fruits at the appointed season gave the assurance that the rest of the harvest would be gathered in safely. This was fulfilled when Christ rose from the dead and presented those who rose with Him on the day after the Sabbath, on Sunday, to God as the First Fruits of the harvest of souls. Christ is gathering in the rest of the harvest. He is gathering those who belong to Him, those who have acknowledged that He paid the penalty for sin and have accepted Him as Lord and Saviour.
God has promised He has gone to prepare a place for His people and that He will come for them. He still has a plan for His chosen ones who will outlive the usefulness of the whole universe. Our future is more certain and more secure than anything else in the world. God has made preparation for us but are we also making preparation for Him? Our relationship with Christ is seen in how we spend the time waiting for His return. We are to be prepared and ready to welcome Him when He returns. If you were expecting the President you would make the necessary preparations to welcome him. What preparations are you making to welcome the Lord when He returns? These preparations should please and delight Him and they can only do so when they result from our obedience to His commandments, which say a lot about our values and about our relationship with Him.
The return of Christ is a prophecy that has yet to be fulfilled. It is celebrated in the Feast of trumpets, which is the third, final and greatest of the harvest seasons. There was a tiny harvest at First fruits and a larger springtime harvest at Pentecost. But the greatest harvest came in the late summer and was called the ‘ingathering’. This has a prophetic significance of the harvest at the end of the age. If God fulfilled Passover, First fruits and Pentecost then He will surely fulfil the rest. The feast of trumpets completes what began on Pentecost. We are experiencing a great harvest of souls and that should tell us that the fulfilment of the Feast of trumpets is also near, when the whole harvest will be gathered in. We need to belong to that great harvest of souls. Christ took the sinner’s guilt, died the sinner’s death and paid the sinner’s penalty. Now it remains for us, as sinners, to accept by faith our identification with Christ. When we do this we are not only identified with Him in His death and burial, but also in His resurrection from the dead and in the new immortal, resurrection life, which He now enjoys.
God has a people to whom He gave a promise. The promise is to Abraham and His descendants who shall be as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. The descendants of Abraham include the Church. He has promised that He will come for the Church, as the Bridegroom, to receive to Himself all true believers, as His bride. This promise is also to the nation of Israel. Christ will also come for the nation of Israel and this time they will acknowledge Jesus as their Messiah. They will thus be reconciled to God and restored to His favour and blessing.
This is the reason why Israel plays a very important role in the timetable of God. Israel is practically in the news every day and we are seeing prophecy being fulfilled in our day and age. Until 1948 no one believed there would be a state of Israel again. The original Israel disappeared from the globe hundreds of years ago but in 1948 a new state of Israel was established with Hebrew as the national language. This language had been completely lost and its use and the re gathering of Jews to Israel is a clear sign, in both the Old and New Testaments, that our age is coming to an end. God has committed Himself to restore Israel, not because they deserve it but because of His grace and mercy. Through Israel’s restoration, God will restore to His own name the glory that has so long been tarnished by the behaviour of Israel. At the same time God is also committed to the spiritual restoration of the Church, although the Church does not deserve restoration any more than Israel does. If we examine the parallel histories of Israel and the Church over the past eighteen centuries, it would be hard to say which has failed God more. Because of God’s grace and mercy the Church and Israel will be saved. Today the gospel is being preached all over the world and everyone is hearing it even though not everyone believes it. Hearing it is the condition that is to be fulfilled before Christ returns. With communication networks the way they are today very soon everyone would have heard the gospel. By accepting the good news we become God’s chosen ones.
The sacrifice of Christ has paid the penalty for our sin. His sacrifice is all-sufficient and faith in Christ makes us partakers of that one sacrifice. As the writer of Hebrews explains, “by one offering He has perfected forever those who are being sanctified.” Perfected and forever speaks of a sacrifice that comprehends every need of the entire human race, and its effects extend throughout time and into eternity. A single sovereign act of God brought together all the guilt and the suffering of humanity and offered one all sufficient solution. No other sacrifice is needed anymore. Before the sacrifice of Christ the High Priest had to offer sacrifices yearly in the temple to cover the sins of the nation. This was done on the Day of Atonement, the most important day in the religious year of the Jewish people. It was the only occasion that the High Priest was allowed into the innermost part of the temple, the Holy of Holies. He went into the Holy of Holies with the blood of the sacrifices that covered the sins of Israel one more year. The blood of animals was sprinkled on the mercy seat to make atonement for his sins and the sins of the nation. This act only covered the sins of the nation for one year and had to be repeated yearly. Because of that, the High Priest never sat down while performing the ceremony. The blood of bulls and goats accomplished an annual covering or atonement. However the blood of Christ is forever. It has accomplished eternal redemption for the Church. Do we belong to God’s chosen ones and are we faithfully serving God by obeying His commandments? We need to be sure we belong to Him - that He is our Lord and Saviour. That is the only way we will belong to His chosen ones who will be gathered together and ushered into everlasting life. Amen!
