This evening, I want to look in the Gospel of Matthew, starting in chapter 24 in verse 36. Tonight, I want us to spend some time contemplating the return of Christ. More specific than that, I want to use our passage in Matthew to help us to be people who live for the return of Christ. So, if you’ll turn with me to Matthew 24:36, we’re going to read until verse 44, and then start again in chapter 25, verse one and read until verse 13.
TEXT: Matthew 24:36-44; 25:1-13
Let’s pray: Father God, I pray that you will bless the words that come from my mouth. Allow them to be your words, Father. Allow our hearts to be open this evening. In Jesus Name, Amen.
This passage is part of a large section where Jesus is talking to his disciples about the future. At the beginning of this section, in chapter 24, Jesus and his disciples were leaving the Temple, when the disciples attempt to draw His attention to the temple’s buildings, but Jesus replies in verse 2, saying “Do you see all these things? I tell you the truth, not one stone here will be left on another, every one will be thrown down”. And Jesus continues to prophesy, looking into the future to tell of his death, resurrection, and then his final return in the last days.
As I studied this passage, and considered it to preach on, it suddenly hit me that I haven’t heard a sermon on this subject at all in as long as I can remember. And it became clear that I needed to share this passage with you.
But, why do we even need to consider this? Why do we need to be people who live for Christ’s return? Isn’t it just enough that we follow Christ? Isn’t it enough that we go to Church on Sunday? Tonight, it is essential that we live for Christ’s return because our lifestyle will change drastically if we subscribe to this idea. We will move from our complacent lifestyles and embrace our Christian walks. Living for Christ’s return gives us an urgency in our day-to-day walks of faith.
And our passage this evening can serve as a guide for us on how to be people that live for Christ’s return, and the implications of that. In fact, there are four characteristics of people who live for Christ’s return, four things that we can put into action in our lives so that we can be those kind of people.
The first characteristic of a person who lives for Christ return is Expect to Meet the Bridegroom. Expect to Meet the Bridegroom. In even simpler terms, to be a person who lives for Christ’s return, we need to be people who expect Christ’s return. It sounds simple, but it’s a necessary first step. And every journey that we would attempt to start out on begins with a first step.
Look at verse 1 of chapter 25. “At that time the kingdom of heaven will be like ten virgins who took their lamps and went out to meet the bridegroom”. On first glance, this statement might not garner much attention; it is, after all just an introductory statement, but I believe that this verse conveys this principle to us this evening. The virgins, who scholars believe were essentially bridesmaids, took their lamps and went out expecting to meet the bridegroom. They didn’t go out hoping to meet the bridegroom, and they certainly didn’t go out doubting they were going to meet the bridegroom, but they went out expecting to meet the bridegroom.
And for us, this evening, this has relevance. You see, to be people who live for Christ’s return, we need to expect to meet the Bridegroom, we need to expect Christ to come back.
In a poll conducted by NEWSWEEK at the end of 2004, it conveyed that only 55% of people, believers and unbelievers included, surveyed believed that Jesus was going to return one day. But, in a similar national American poll conducted in 2005 by The Pew Forum of evangelical Christians, it was shown that only 70% of Christians today actually believe in the second coming of Jesus. I was shocked at this number, even though the number is a clear majority. It still concerns me that 30% of Bible-believing Christians don’t believe that Jesus will return ever!
Essentially, that means that in a morning service with 200 people in attendance that as many as 60 people in that service don’t really believe in the Second Coming of Christ. To me, this is incredible because part of our hope as Christians is not only will we go to Heaven when we die, but that Christ will return to reunite all His saints with Him forever. The entire book of Revelation is dedicated to the subject of the return of Christ in the last days. But according to this study, only 70% of us believe that it is to be taken literally.
Jesus, himself, has promised His return. Look the Gospel of John, chapter 14, verses 1-3: "Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am.
To live our Christian lives to the fullest, I believe that we need to be people that expect the return of Christ, people who believe that Jesus will literally return to literally reunite believers literally for eternity. And if you refuse to believe this, well, I guess you might as well tune me out now because the rest of this message is based on this foundation.
There’s a second characteristic of a person who lives for Christ’s return. A person who lives for Christ’s return will Present themselves pure to the bridegroom. So we must present ourselves pure to Christ.
I don’t believe that the Jesus ever used random characters in His parables, and the parable of the ten virgins is no exception. I believe that the fact that these girls were virgins was no coincidence. The more I read this passage, the more it made sense that the virgins symbolized this characteristic of purity, but I wanted something to back this up. Not that I was unsure of myself, but I wanted to show this beyond a shadow of a doubt, so I went to Adam Clarke’s commentary to see his take on this verse, and, lucky for me, he agreed with me.
The importance of this should be self-evident, people who are living for Christ’s return need to present themselves pure, blameless to Him.
It’s like in Old Testament Judaism. When the priest prepared to sacrifice to Jehovah, he would go and take a lamb who was perfect, no defects, no blemishes, no physical problems of any kind. If that perfect lamb that was to be sacrificed fell and broke it’s leg on the day of the sacrifice, guess what? That lamb wasn’t going to get sacrificed. Lucky for the lamb, not so lucky for the priest. Now, he’d have to go out and find a new lamb to sacrifice.
In the same way, when we present ourselves to Christ, whether when we die or upon His return, we need to present ourselves to Him pure, unblemished.
The Apostle Paul, in the conclusion of his first epistle to the Thessalonians, even touches on this when he says, “May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
And the Apostle Peter in 1 Peter 3:14 admonishes his readers to make every effort to be found spotless, blameless and at peace with Christ.
As people who live for Christ’s return, we become people who strive for purity in every area of our lives. We don’t just live for today because we are looking ahead to eternity. We hear so much from people today proclaiming “Live for the moment! Don’t worry about the consequences”, but as Christians living for Christ’s return, we know that the moment is not all there is, and that there are eternal consequences to how we live our lives on earth.
As people living for eternity, we know now that we must be people who expect Christ’s return and people who present themselves pure to Christ. And the third characteristic of a person living for Christ’s return is they must be Prepared to Wait for the Bridegroom. We must be Prepared to wait for Christ’s return.
In the parable of the ten virgins, we see one main distinction between these women: there are five wise and five foolish women. But why are the five considered foolish? What did they do wrong? Look at verse 3 to 8, of chapter 25: The foolish ones took their lamps but did not take any oil with them. The wise, however, took oil in jars along with their lamps. The bridegroom was a long time in coming, and they all became drowsy and fell asleep.
"At midnight the cry rang out: ’Here’s the bridegroom! Come out to meet him!’
"Then all the virgins woke up and trimmed their lamps. The foolish ones said to the wise, ’Give us some of your oil; our lamps are going out.’
" ’No,’ they replied, ’there may not be enough for both us and you. Instead, go to those who sell oil and buy some for yourselves.’
The foolish women in this story were not properly prepared to meet the bridegroom, but more specifically, they were not prepared to wait for the bridegroom. First, they neglect to bring extra oil for their lamps, then they fall asleep, then they realize that they have run out of oil and have to go and buy more.
Are we prepared to wait? Or the more important question should be, are we prepared to wait without losing faith? Christianity has been waiting for close to two thousand years for Christ to return, but are we willing to still wait? Or are we just going to give up believe that Christ will ever return?
Are we willing to wait? We live in a society that hates to wait. It is a society of fast food, fast cars, fast women, quick money, quick fixes, Quick Stops, instant rice, instant oatmeal, instant cash, and instant gratification, and many times we have lost our ability to just STOP! and wait.
Waiting isn’t easy, but we have, in fact, been called to wait. Isaiah 40:31 even promises that those who wait on the LORD shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.
It will be difficult at times to wait for Christ’s return. As we witness tragedies in our world with incomprehensible horrors, there are those who despair and wonder if God is still at work. There are those who cry out for Christ to return and end this suffering. It won’t be easy, that’s for sure, but we need to keep the faith. Even when it feels like He may never return, we need to remain faithful to His promises.
I’m reminded of the old song by Journey “Don’t Stop Believing”. In it, the singer shares the stories of a “small town girl” and a “city boy”, among others, who have big dreams, but just can’t seem to achieve those dreams. The song then admonishes them to never stop believing, but to hold on to that feeling.
In a similar way, we have big “dreams”. Many Christians dream of Christ’s triumphant return, but oftentimes we get frustrated with the evil in the world and many begin to doubt. Now, we’ve come to the point that 30% of Christians don’t even believe that Christ will return at all. But, today, we need to remember “Don’t Stop Believing”.
And as we study the characteristics of a person living for Christ’s return, we are reminded that a person waiting for eternity expects to meet the bridegroom; they present themselves pure to the bridegroom; and now we know that they are prepared to wait for the bridegroom. But there is one more characteristic that is crucial to the person living for Christ’s return. And that is: a person living for Christ’s return Anticipates the Immediate Arrival of the Bridegroom. And we need to anticipate the immediate return of Christ.
Look back at the first part of the passage we read this evening. Chapter 24, verse 42: "Therefore keep watch, because you do not know on what day your Lord will come. But understand this: If the owner of the house had known at what time of night the thief was coming, he would have kept watch and would not have let his house be broken into. So you also must be ready, because the Son of Man will come at an hour when you do not expect him.
In that survey I was telling you about earlier, I found that only about 70% of believers actually believe that Jesus is coming back at all, but I found something that concerned me even more: only about 20% of believers surveyed believe that Jesus may come back in their lifetimes. Only 20%! So, basically, only 1 in 5 people actually believe that Jesus could come back in their lifetime.
But some of you may be asking, so what? What does that matter? What difference does this really make? Here’s the difference: when you don’t know when something’s going to happen, but you know it will happen soon, you begin to act differently. It’s like if somebody told you that you were going to die sometime in the next two days, you would suddenly have this deep desire to make things right in your life, and with the people in your life because you know that you don’t have much time. And when you have made your peace, then you could pass on with a clean conscience.
Or it’s like a child when Christmas is coming. They get this feeling like suddenly they need to act right and be polite and respect their parents because if they don’t, Santa won’t bring them any presents.
The point is that when you are anticipating the immediacy of something, it changes your perspective on life. If we expect that we can live for 80 years, or even if we expect to live one more year, it affects our outlook on life. We can wait to tell our non-Christian friend about our faith. We can wait to get our lives right with God. We can wait to make a decision to follow Jesus. But, if we live anticipating Christ’s immediate return, then we will live with an urgency that we would otherwise be without. Suddenly, we can’t wait to tell our unsaved friend about Christ. Suddenly, we can’t wait to get our lives right with God. Suddenly, we can’t wait to make a decision to follow Christ.
Christ’s return will come like a thief in the night, as Paul puts it in 1 Thessalonians 5:2. Not that it’s a bad thing, at all! Quite the opposite in fact. Think of the thief in this instance as like more of somebody coming unexpected in the night to give you ten million dollars.
Why was the New Testament church so successful? Why did the Gospel spread like wildfire? Among other things, the apostles and early Christians believed fervently that Christ would be returning soon. So, they did all they could to spread the Gospel as far as they could as quickly as they could because they wanted to have as many people ready for His return as possible. Our lives should reflect nothing less.
As we close this evening, I just want to encourage you. Like I said earlier, this excites me. I get excited when I think about the prospect of living as if Christ would return tomorrow. It causes me to stop and consider the way I live my life. I am by no means where I want to be, but I believe that the Holy Spirit is helping me to get to the point where I am living my life with urgency. One of the biggest traps that Satan puts before us isn’t that God can’t do anything through us, but that God has big plans for us, but they can wait. You don’t need to do it now. And this evening, I encourage you ask the Lord: “What can I do so my life is one that is lived for Your return?” It’s an exciting journey, and it’s one that He will reward.
Let’s pray: Father God, I thank you for your promises. Thank you for your promise to return for your people. Lord, I pray that your Word will change our lives. Father, I pray that we will be people that live for your return, that we will be people that live with an urgency to see Your will done and to see people saved. For we pray these things in the Name of the One who taught us to pray saying: Our Father, who art in Heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done on earth as it is in Heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For Thine is the kingdom, the power and the glory forever and ever. Amen.
