The Second Coming of Christ

Don't let your heart be troubled. Believe in God. Believe also in me. In my Father's house are many homes. If it weren't so, I would have told you. I am going to prepare a place for you. If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and will receive you to myself; that where I am, you may be also.

Jesus' own promise to His disciples. He left in a body, He prepares a place in a body, and He returns to take His people in a body.

When he had said these things, as they were looking, he was taken up, and a cloud received him out of their sight. While they were looking steadfastly into the sky as he went, behold, two men stood by them in white clothing, who also said, "You men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who was received up from you into the sky, will come back in the same way as you saw him going into the sky."

"In the same way" — visibly, bodily, in the clouds. Not invisibly, not silently. The same way.

and then the sign of the Son of Man will appear in the sky. Then all the tribes of the earth will mourn, and they will see the Son of Man coming on the clouds of the sky with power and great glory. He will send out his angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they will gather together his chosen ones from the four winds, from one end of the sky to the other.

Every tribe on earth will see Him. There is nothing secret about the Second Coming.

Behold, he is coming with the clouds, and every eye will see him, including those who pierced him. All the tribes of the earth will mourn over him. Even so, Amen.

Every eye. Including those who pierced Him — meaning those who put Him to death will be raised to see this.

For the Lord himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of the archangel, and with God's trumpet. The dead in Christ will rise first, then we who are alive, who are left, will be caught up together with them in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air. So we will be with the Lord forever.

A shout. A trumpet. A resurrection. Loud, unmistakable, public. The "rapture" of this passage is the same event as the Second Coming — there are not two stages.

Behold, I tell you a mystery. We will not all sleep, but we will all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised incorruptible, and we will be changed. For this corruptible must become incorruptible, and this mortal must become immortal.

Immortality is given at the Second Coming. We do not have it now — we receive it then.

But no one knows of that day and hour, not even the angels of heaven, but my Father only.

Anyone who sets a date is — by Jesus' own words — wrong. The hour is unknown. The signs of the season are not.

Watch therefore, for you don't know in what hour your Lord comes. But know this, that if the master of the house had known in what watch of the night the thief was coming, he would have watched, and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. Therefore also be ready, for in an hour that you don't expect, the Son of Man will come.

Readiness is not about the right calendar. It is about the right heart, today.

looking for the blessed hope and appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ;

The Second Coming is called the "blessed hope" — not a threat, but the long-awaited arrival of the One who loves us.

so Christ also, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, without sin, to those who are eagerly waiting for him for salvation.

He comes "without sin" — His atoning work complete — and "for salvation" — to deliver, not to condemn, those who wait.

The Lord is not slow concerning his promise, as some count slowness; but is patient with us, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. But the day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night; in which the heavens will pass away with a great noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fervent heat, and the earth and the works that are in it will be burned up.

The delay is not slowness; it is mercy. He is waiting for more people to come home.

and to give relief to you who are afflicted with us, when the Lord Jesus is revealed from heaven with his mighty angels in flaming fire, giving vengeance to those who don't know God, and to those who don't obey the Good News of our Lord Jesus, who will pay the penalty: eternal destruction from the face of the Lord and from the glory of his might, when he comes in that day to be glorified in his saints, and to be admired among all those who have believed.

There is a sober side — judgment for those who reject Him — and a glorious side: He is "glorified in his saints" and "admired" by His people. He receives the worship and we receive the joy.

He who testifies these things says, "Yes, I come quickly." Amen! Yes, come, Lord Jesus.

The last words of the Bible. The proper response to the promise is one short prayer.