‘The Lord Himself’

‘The Lord Himself’

For the Lord himself shall descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with the trump of God: and the dead in Christ shall rise first.

I Thessalonians 4:16

Christ finishes what He starts, and makes good on all His promises.  On the night before He went to the cross He declared to His disciples, ‘I will come again and receive you unto Myself.’  When He ascended from the Mount of Olives after His resurrection, the angels said to the disciples, ‘Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven.’ From these passages, and others which we could cite, we conclude that Christ will inevitably return, personally, and powerfully.  Over the centuries, believers have differed about some of the details of Christ’s return.  Upon one point we most certainly agree:  Christ is going to return.  According to our text, He will return visibly, openly, ‘with a shout, with the voice of an archangel and with the trumpet of God.’  On every other promise which Christ has ever made He has been as good as His word.  We have every reason to believe, on the basis of the character which He has demonstrated thus far, that He will fulfill His word in this matter as well.  We live daily in the light of this promise.  He may arrive in our lifetime, or after we have passed from this scene of time.  Either way, His return will affect us.  He will either raise us from the dead, or ‘gather us together with Him in the air’ at His arrival.  Here is a future expectation toward which we can look today.  Jesus is coming again.

Our Glorious Savior, and our Living Lord,
we look forward unto the day when our faith shall become sight.
With all the ancient saints of God, we say,
‘Even so, come, Lord Jesus.’

Tomm Tice
Where the Bush is Burning