Thought Exercise on The Second Coming Of Christ

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Dostoyevsky and the Last Judgment

Author

Keywords

Scripture

1 Timothy 1:15, Romans 5:8, Luke 19:10, Revelation 3:20, Matthew 9:13, Luke 15:11-32

At the last Judgment Christ will say to us, "Come, you also! Come, drunkards! Come, weaklings! Come, children of shame!" And He will say to us: "Vile beings, you who are in the image of...

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A Phone Line to the Grave

Author

Lee Strobel

Keywords

I hate to admit it, but there is actually a minister in a city in America who has a phone line connected from his wife’s grave to his office because before she died, they had agreed that if she was pr...

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The Time Between the Time

Author

Fleming Rutledge

Keywords

Scripture

Colossians 3:3-4

In a very real sense, the Christian community lives in Advent all the time. It can well be called the Time Between, because the people of God live in the time between the first coming of Christ, incog...

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The Parousia Defined

Author

James Bryan Smith

Keywords

Scripture

1 Corinthians 4:15-17, James 5:7, Matthew 25:31-32, Titus 2:13, Revelation 22:12-13

Paul’s term for the return of Jesus is called the parousia. Parousia was used to describe an imperial visit by a king to a city. People would send a delegation outside the city gates to greet the dign...

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Christ, Too, Experienced Death

Author

Matthew Y. Emerson

Keywords

Scripture

John 11:25-26, 1 Thessalonians 4:13-14, Romans 6:4, 1 Corinthians 15:20-22, 2 Corinthians 4:14

What, as Christians, can we say to those who face death, either their own or that of their loved ones? We certainly can give them the hope of Christ’s resurrection, if they or their loved one has trus...

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Is the Truth Good News?

Author

Keywords

In the novel The Second Coming one of Walker Percy’s characters says about Christians, “I cannot be sure they don’t have the truth. But if they have the truth, why is it the case that they are rep...

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The Covenants of Scripture

Author

Merrill F. Unger

Keywords

Covenant

Scripture

Hebrews 13:20, Genesis 1:26-28, Genesis 1:26, Genesis 3:14-19, Genesis 3:14, Genesis 8:20-9, Genesis 9:5-6, Genesis 12:1-3, Galatians 3:16, John 8:56-58, 2 Corinthians 3:7-9, Deuteronomy 30:1-10, Deuteronomy 30:1, 2 Samuel 7:4-17, Luke 1:31-33, Acts 1:6, Revelation 19:16, Matthew 26:28, Mark 14:24, Luke 22:20, Hebrews 8:8-12, Galatians 3:13-20

Eternal covenant, Heb 13:20—The redemptive covenant before time began, between the Father and the Son. By this covenant we have eternal redemption, an eternal peace from the ‘God of peace’, through th...

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A Watchman at the Gate

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 24:36-44

Editor’s Note: The following was an imagination exercise used while preaching on Matthew 24:36-44, I began by inviting the congregation to close their eyes. Imagine you are a watchmen (or woman) stan...

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Gentleness: The Indespensable Trait of True Christians

Author

Ray Ortlund

Keywords

Gentleness

Scripture

Matthew 11:29

One of Christianity’s most brilliant theologians, Jonathan Edwards, taught us that gentleness—he called it “a lamblike, dovelike spirit”—is not an optional extra but instead is “the true and distingui...

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Joy Awakens from a Smell

Author

Cyd and Geoff Holsclaw

Keywords

On a trip to France during college, I (Cyd) was walking through a historic garden in Paris with my older sister. Rounding one of the reflecting pools, we both caught a familiar scent and stopped dead ...

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Expectations for the Messiah King

Author

N. T. Wright

Keywords

Scripture

Revelation 19:16, Matthew 2:2, John 12:12-16

In this short excerpt, scholar N.T. Wright describes the expectations regarding the Jewish messiah king: The coming King would do two main things, according to a variety of texts and as we study a v...

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The Beginning is About the End

Author

Karl Rahner

Keywords

Advent

Scripture

Luke 21:25-33

It is a strange thing. At the beginning of our preparation for Christmas, the gospel is about the end of the world. And yet, it is not surprising. For what is already contained in a small beginning is...

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A Double Blessing

Author

Mark Batterson

Keywords

Blessing

Scripture

Isaiah 61:1, Psalm 96:1-3, 1 Corinthians 10:31, Colossians 3:17, Psalm 40:3, 1 Peter 4:10-11, Psalm 67:1-2, 2 Corinthians 9:10-11

During his celebrated career as a composer, George Frideric Handel wrote forty-two operas, twenty-nine oratorios, and 120 cantatas. Of Handel, Ludwig van Beethoven said, “To him I bow the knee.” Hande...

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The End of Jesus’ Ministry?

Author

Andrew Purves

Keywords

Scripture

Hebrews 7:24-25, Acts 2:32-33, John 14:16-18, Colossians 1:27, 2 Corinthians 13:5

The ministry of Jesus does not end with his resurrection. In his ascension, he does not abandon his humanity. He is not the ascended Lord apart from everything that has happened between his incarnatio...

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Electrical Fires and Addressing Sin at the Source

Author

David Peterson

Keywords

Scripture

Mark 7:20-23, Proverbs 4:23, James 1:14-15, Luke 6:43-45, Colossians 2:23

One afternoon, I was playing with my son in our living room when I suddenly smelled something burning. I stood up and walked around, nose high in the air, sniffing furiously. My wife smelled it too, s...

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The End is Nearish

Author

Neal Chase

Keywords

PRESS RELEASE DATE: NOVEMBER 1, 1993 We didn’t make a mistake when we wrote in our previous releases that New York would be destroyed on September 4 and October 14, 1993. We didn’t make a mistake, no...

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Saying “Thy Kingdom Come”

Author

Hugh Latimer

Keywords

Scripture

Luke 21:25

There are a great number among the Christian people, who, in the Lord’s prayer, when they pray, “Thy kingdom come,” pray that this day may come; but yet, nonetheless, they are drowned in the world: th...

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It is Just so Good it Must be True

Author

Phillip Yancey

Keywords

Scripture

Isaiah 25:6-9, Daniel 7:13-14, Zechariah 8:4-5, Luke 24:36-43, Revelation 21:1-5, Psalm 16:11

One day when George MacDonald, the great Scottish preacher and writer, was talking with his son, the conversation turned to heaven and the prophets’ version of the end of all things. “It seems too goo...

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An Acted Parable

Author

James S. Stewart

Keywords

Scripture

Zechariah 9:9, Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11:8-11, Luke 19:36-44, John 12:16-19

The entrance into Jerusalem was an acted parable. It gave the faithful the sign they had been waiting for. It inaugurated the Master’s final mission to his people and was a fitting prelude to the days...

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The Supreme Political Event of World History

Author

R. C. Sproul

Keywords

Scripture

Acts 1:9-11, Luke 24:51, Ephesians 1:20-21, Philippians 2:8-11, Hebrews 10:12-13

The ascension of Jesus was the supreme political event of world history. He ascended not so much to a place as to an office. He departed from the arena of humiliation and suffering to enter into his g...

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Thinking about the Life to Come

Author

Timothy Keller

Keywords

The manner in which Christians have thought about life after death, or about the world to come, has varied considerably from century to century and from place to place. It is easy enough to understand...

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Living in the New Creation

Author

Tony Reinke

Keywords

New Creation

Scripture

2 Corinthians 3:18

To partake of the new creation is to see Christ for the first time. And his glory changes us. “We all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image fr...

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The Joyful Announcement of the Gospel of God

Author

Darrell W. Johnson

Keywords

Sermon on the Mount

Pastor and Professor Darrell W. Johnson sets the scene for the Sermon on the Mount with great description. This could serve as a model for the beginning of a sermon on the S.O.M. They were sitting i...

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Advent is God Coming to Us

Author

Austin Farrar

Keywords

Advent is a coming, not our coming to God, but his to us. We cannot come to God, he is beyond our reach; but he can come to us, for we are not beneath his mercy. Even in another life, as St. John sees...

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How the World Might End

Author

Chris Stroup

Keywords

For centuries there have been innumerable theories as to when and how the world might end. Here are some highlights gleaned from alleged prophecies: In 960 Bernard of Thuringia, a German theologian, ...

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Confusion About the Ascension

Author

Mike Cosper

Keywords

The Ascension of Christ

Scripture

Hebrews 7:27, Hebrews 7:23, Hebrews 7:25

If we’re not careful, we might mistake the meaning of Jesus’s ascension. It sounds kind of like a retirement send-off—like Jesus finishes his work and sits down to enjoy the fruits of his labor, but t...

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Christianity: A One-Way Ticket to Heaven?

Author

N. T. Wright

Keywords

Most people today imagine that the point of Christianity is “to go to heaven when you die.” That’s what most believers believe. It’s what most unbelievers unbelieve. It’s certainly what journalists, b...

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A Transfer of Funds

Author

Randy Alcorn

Keywords

Scripture

Matthew 6:19-21

When Jesus warns us not to store up treasures on Earth, it’s not because wealth might be lost; it’s because wealth will always be lost. Either it leaves us while we live, or we leave it when we die. N...

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He is Coming: A Triumphal Entry

Author

Stuart R. Strachan, Jr.

Keywords

Scripture

Zechariah 9:9, Matthew 21:1-11, Mark 11:8-11, Luke 19:36-44, John 12:16-19

Just under 80 years ago, a crowd gathered on a humid August day to commence what was to be an unparalleled event for its time. Hundreds of thousands of spectators, police officers, and soldiers gather...

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Something Strange is Happening

Author

Epiphanius of Cyprus

Keywords

Holy Saturday

Something strange is happening – there is a great silence on earth today, a great silence and stillness. The whole earth keeps silence because the King is asleep. The earth trembled and is still becau...

thought exercise on The Second Coming Of Christ

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